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Court denies anticipatory bail to two in CM’s wife derogatory post case
Chaudhari, Pandit, Wankhede, and Varma were arrested after failing to comply with the police notice and later applied for bail before Additional Sessions Judge AS Gandhi
A Pune sessions court on Thursday denied anticipatory bail to two individuals in connection with a social media post allegedly defaming Amruta Fadnavis, wife of Maharashtra chief minister Devendra Fadnavis. The court, however, granted bail to four other accused in the case registered in April by the Pune cyber police following a complaint by advocate Basavraj Yadvad.
Seven persons—Nikhil Sankpal, Datta Chaudhari, Baliram Pandit, Ashish Wankhede, Shailesh Varma, Bhumish Save, and Abhijit Phadnis —were named in the FIR and issued notices to join the investigation. Of them, only Sankpal, who originally uploaded the post, responded. The post was viewed over 16,000 times, liked by 895 users, and retweeted by 187, including the six others named in the complaint.
Chaudhari, Pandit, Wankhede, and Varma were arrested after failing to comply with the police notice and later applied for bail before Additional Sessions Judge AS Gandhi. They were granted bail. The court rejected the anticipatory bail pleas filed by the absconding two, Save and Phadnis.
“The accused did not verify the truth of the content before retweeting. Despite being served notices, they did not cooperate with the investigation,” the court noted in its order. “Hence, they are not entitled to anticipatory bail.”
Public Prosecutor Rajesh Kavediya, while opposing the bail pleas, told the court, “Character is an ornament for any woman, and since the post was derogatory, bail should not be granted.” Advocate SK Jain, representing Amruta Fadnavis, also opposed the applications.
The prosecution submitted that Save, after retweeting the objectionable post, shared another tweet stating he would offer legal assistance to anyone booked in similar cases. “This was done after the FIR was registered, indicating deliberate and unjustifiable conduct,” the court observed.
