Granting relief to Punjabi singer Gurdas Maan, the Punjab and Haryana High Court (HC) dismissed a plea challenging a Jalandhar court order whereby cancellation report against the singer in connection with a case pertaining to hurting religious sentiments had been accepted.
A bench of Justice Sandeep Moudgil dismissed the petition on Thursday. The detailed copy of the judgement is yet to be released by the HC.
Complainant Harjinder Singh had moved the HC against a February 22 order of the sub-divisional judicial magistrate of Nakodar, accepting the cancellation report in the criminal case in question.
Maan was booked on August 26, 2021 by the Jalandhar police for allegedly hurting religious sentiments. According to the allegations, Maan had said while performing in a programme that Laddi Shah was a descendant of Sri Guru Amar Das, a fact stated to be “factually and historically incorrect”. The allegations were that by doing so the singer had hurt the religious sentiments of the Sikh community. Maan had subsequently apologised.
The plea mentioned that the petitioner’s case was based on a video recording supplied to the police which was on record of the trial court but the same had been ignored. “The cancellation report has been accepted and the protest petition was ordered to be dismissed being against the very basic principle that a complaint is not an encyclopedia and statement of witnesses ought to have been examined minutely but the same has been ignored without any reasons merely on the basis of surmises with a pre-determined mind,” the petitioner had mentioned.
{{/usCountry}}The plea mentioned that the petitioner’s case was based on a video recording supplied to the police which was on record of the trial court but the same had been ignored. “The cancellation report has been accepted and the protest petition was ordered to be dismissed being against the very basic principle that a complaint is not an encyclopedia and statement of witnesses ought to have been examined minutely but the same has been ignored without any reasons merely on the basis of surmises with a pre-determined mind,” the petitioner had mentioned.
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