Supreme court raps UP Police and directs it to grant immediate bail to scribe Prashant Kanojia

The supreme court of India has strongly criticized and rapped the Uttar Pradesh police and the government for showing extreme hurry and desperation in arresting journalist Prashant Kanojia while hearing the Habeas Corpus petition filed by the wife of arrested journalist Jagisha Arora.

The apex court granted immediate bail to the arrested scribe and directed the UP government to release him on bail forthwith, subject to the final results of the on going investigations. The jurists said has anybody ever heard of such arrests for tweets ? How can the freedom of speech and expression be gagged in a democratic society?

The court has however also said that the journalists or anybody using the social media platforms should think himself/ herself as responsible citizens, exercise restraint and avoid passing or writing derogatory remarks against anyone especially without corroboration or evidence.

However, while passing the bail orders the court has not taken the tweets of Prashant Kanojia under consideration but issued clear instructions that no derogatory remarks should be written or tweeted against anybody in social media.

It also asked the state police to carry on the investigations but Kanojia should be immediately released on bail.

It may be recalled that apart from Prashant Kanojia, who has been charged under section 500 and 61 of the IPC for his derogatory on line comments against the UP CM and posting a woman’s vedio casting aspersions on Yogi Aditya Nath and subsequently arresting him, two other journalists, one Channel News Head of Nation Live and its editor Shukla have also been arrested and two other employees who absconded employees are being searched around for arrests for incessantly airing the vedio and the related news item.

The studio of Nation Live in sector 65 Noida has also been sealed.

There had been protests at Press Club of India yesterday by four media organisations terming the UP police action as derogatory, uncalled for and authoritarian to muzzle free speech and media freedom.

Scribe Prashant Kanojia’s wife has complained how the UP police had arbitrarily arrested her husband from their Delhi house in a huff and arrogant manner as if he is a hardened criminal.