No Court Relief To Singer For Post On Madhya Pradesh Urination Case

The Madhya Pradesh High Court dismissed folk singer Neha Singh Rathore's request to quash an FIR against her for sharing a cartoon after a tribal youth was urinated upon by a man.

The FIR was filed on July 9 last year in Chhatarpur over a cartoon that showed a half-naked person urinating on another while a khaki half-pant was seen on the floor. A person in a white shirt with a black cap was also seen.

Rejecting Ms Rathore's plea, Justice GS Ahluwalia, in his May 15 order, said, "This court is of the considered opinion that no case is made out warranting interference. The application fails and is hereby dismissed." 

The cartoon which was uploaded by the applicant on her Twitter and Instagram account was not in accordance with the incident that had taken place and certain things were added by the applicant on her own, the court order said.

"The court is of the considered opinion that it cannot be said that the applicant had uploaded the cartoon by exercising her fundamental right of free speech and expression. Although an artist must have the liberty to criticize through satire, adding a particular dress in the cartoon cannot be said to be satire," the court order emphasised.

"The addition of a particular dress was indicative of the fact that the applicant wanted to communicate that the offence was committed by a person belonging to a particular ideology. Thus, it was a clear case of making an attempt to disrupt harmony and to provoke feelings of enmity, hatred, or ill-will," the court order added.

The applicant attempted to involve a group of particular ideology without any basis, and therefore, it would not come within the purview of Article 19(1)(a) of the Constitution, the court said, adding even a satirical expression may be prohibited under Article 19(2) of the Constitution.

Ms Rathore had shared the cartoon after police arrested Sidhi resident Pravesh Shukla for allegedly urinating on a tribal man, an incident which caused national outrage after videos of it went viral on social media.

Incidentally, the opposition Congress had alleged Shukla was associated with the ruling BJP.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)