Bombay HC extends interim protection for Sharjeel Usmani

The court also asked Usmani to decide on whether he wanted to impose a self-restraint from speaking to the media.

While noting that Sharjeel Usmani, an accused booked by Swargate police station on February 2 under section 153A of the Indian Penal Code, was cooperating with the investigators, the Bombay high court (HC) accepted the state’s assurance that no coercive action would be taken if Usmani presented himself before the investigators. The court directed Usmani to attend the police station on March 18 and further observed that it was up to Usmani to impose a self-restriction from speaking to media about the investigation in the case. The matter has been posted for further hearing on March 22.

Sharjeel Usmani has been booked for allegedly making a provocative speech at Elgar Parishad in Pune on January 30, 2021. (HT FILE)

Usmani, former student leader of Aligarh Muslim University, was booked by the police based on a letter by Pradeep Gawade, regional secretary of Bharatiya Janata Yuva Morcha (BJYM), the youth wing of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). Gawade alleged that Usmani had made a provocative speech at Elgar Parishad conference on January 30 in Pune.

The division bench of justice SS Shinde and justice Manish Pitale, while hearing the petition filed by Usmani seeking quashing of the FIR filed against him and staying the proceedings arising out of it, was informed by senior advocate Mihir Desai that the speech had been taken out of context by Gawade.

Desai further submitted that the speech needed to be looked from the aspect of what message was being sent by the speech, who was it addressed to, and the context in which it was made before deciding whether it was provocative. He added that it could be construed from the wordings of the speech that he intended to send the message that everyone should join and work together, and in that case no offence was made out against Usmani.

He also added that as per the assurance in the previous hearing, Usmani had attended the police station as per HC’s directions and hence the protection from coercive action should continue.

However, advocate Aniket Nikam, who was allowed to intervene on behalf of Gawade, opposed the petition and said young minds or even strong minds would get influenced by the manner in which the speech was made, and hence the petition should not be entertained.

Additional public prosecutor JP Yagnik, for the state, informed the court that the police was not willing to extend the assurance of no coercive action as Usmani had been speaking to the media about the complaint against him.

After hearing the submissions, the court noted that it would have to read the speech by Usmani in its entirety to ascertain his intent while saying “don’t trust Indian judiciary, parliament...and I say we are in a state of war...” and stated that the court was open to criticism.

The court further asked Yagnik whether Usmani had cooperated as per previous directions. On receiving an affirmative reply, the court asked him to continue the earlier assurance of no coercive action provided Usmani cooperated with the probe. The court then directed Desai to tell his client to decide on whether he wanted to impose a self-restraint on himself from speaking to the media, to which Desai assured he would convey.