The Supreme Court docket on Monday stayed the proceedings in a prison case lodged in opposition to Tamil Nadu BJP president Ok Annamalai for allegedly delivering a hate speech in opposition to Christians in an interview to a YouTube channel in October 2022 with regard to bursting firecrackers.
After perusing the transcript of the statements given within the interview, a bench of Justices Sanjiv Khanna and Dipankar Datta noticed, Prima facie, there isn’t any hate speech. No case is made out.
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The bench issued a discover to the complainant, who has accused Annamalai of delivering a hate speech in opposition to Christians within the interview on October 22, 2022 with regard to the bursting of crackers, two days earlier than Diwali.
Difficulty discover returnable within the week commencing April 29, 2024. In the intervening time, there shall be a keep on additional proceedings earlier than the trial courtroom, the bench mentioned in its order.
Senior advocate Siddharth Luthra and advocate Sai Deepak, showing within the courtroom on behalf of Annamalai, confirmed the transcript of the interview to the bench and mentioned it’s not a case of hate speech.
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Annamalai has moved the highest courtroom difficult a Madras Excessive Court docket order that had refused to quash the summons issued to him within the case. Refusing to quash the summons on February 8, the excessive courtroom had noticed that the psychological affect on a person or a bunch should even be thought-about below the definition of hate speech. The summons was issued by the trial courtroom based mostly on a criticism filed by a person named V Piyush.
The excessive courtroom had famous that Annamalai had given an interview to a YouTube channel, the run-time of which was almost 44.25 minutes, and a six-and-a-half-minute extract of it was shared on the Bharatiya Janata Get together’s X (then Twitter) deal with on October 22, 2022. The content material of the message was that there was an internationally-funded Christian missionary NGO that was allegedly concerned in destroying the Hindu tradition by submitting instances within the Supreme Court docket to forestall Hindus from bursting crackers. Prima facie, the statements disclosed a divisive intent on the petitioner’s half to painting the NGO as performing in opposition to Hindu tradition, the excessive courtroom had mentioned.
(This report has been revealed as a part of an auto-generated syndicate wire feed. Other than the headline, no modifying has been finished within the copy by ABP Stay.)