The lawsuit was launched on May 19 when Akash Sharma, the Chattisgarh president of the National Student Union of India, the Congress’ youth wing, submitted a complaint. The leaders were charged with counterfeiting the letterhead of the Research Department of Congress and publishing “false and fabricated” materials. The paper was tweeted by Singh, Patra, and other BJP leaders, who said it was intended to ruin the country’s and Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s reputation.
Congress, on the other hand, had informed the police that the “toolkit” was a forgery. The paper was also constructed on a phony Congress letterhead, according to fact-checking website AltNews.
Following the complaint, the BJP leaders were charged under the Indian Penal Code’s sections 504 (intentional insult with intent to cause a breach of the peace), 505 (public mischief), 469 (forgery), and 188 (disobedience to a lawfully proclaimed order by a public officer).
During the court, Singh’s lawyer, eminent attorney Mahesh Jethmalani, claimed that the tweets had no impact on the community and that the FIR was unjustified, according to Live Law. He stated, “This is a political battle between two different political groups.” “Because this is within the scope of freedom of speech and has no bearing on peace and tranquillity, no offense has been committed.”
The High Court ruled that sections 504 and 505 were not made out since the tweets had no effect on the peace. The High Court stated that the material was already in the public domain when the petitioners tweeted it, citing Section 469 of the Criminal Code.
The judge said that Section 188 did not meet with Section 195 of the Criminal Procedure Code, which lays forth the requirements for prosecuting public workers for contempt of legitimate authority.
The FIR was subsequently put on hold till the next hearing date. According to The Times of India, the state’s counsel has requested three weeks to file responses.
Patra and Singh’s tweet was labeled as “manipulated media” by Twitter. The Congress has requested that Union ministers Giriraj Singh, Piyush Goyal, Smriti Irani, Ravi Shankar Prasad, Prahlad Joshi, Dharmendra Pradhan, Ramesh Pokhriyal, Thawarchand Gehlot, Harsh Vardhan, Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi, and Gajendra Singh Shekhawat have the same tag placed on their tweets.
