Ahmedabad court allows govt to withdraw complaint against Hardik Patel

Gujarat Congress working president Hardik Patel still has at least a dozen cases registered against him including one in which he is accused of sedition.

Updated on: May 10, 2022, 03:19:02 IST

By Maulik Pathak

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A sessions court in Ahmedabad on Monday allowed the Gujarat government to withdraw a criminal case registered against 21 people including Patidar leader and Gujarat Congress working president Hardik Patel on a complaint by a Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) councillor in 2017.

Patidar leader Hardik Patel in 2015 spearheaded a quota agitation to seek reservation in government jobs and colleges for the Patidar or Patel community. (ANI)

“Allowing the application under section 321 of CrPC the sessions court orders release of all 21 accused named in the FIR... without any charges against them,” additional sessions judge Prashant N Raval said in his order.

In his police complaint, BJP councillor in the Ahmedabad municipal corporation Paresh Patel alleged Hardik Patel and his supporters assembled outside his house, trespassed into his house and vandalised the premises.

A metropolitan court rejected the government’s request in April, prompting the state government to appeal against the decision in a sessions court the following day arguing that the lower court’s order was “wrong and contrary to the provisions of law.”

Section 321 of the Code of Criminal Procedure allows the prosecutor to withdraw from the prosecution of any case if the court allows it. This request can be filed at any stage before the judgment is pronounced.

The sessions judge allowed the state to withdraw the case, observing that the magisterial court’s focus appeared to be more on the previous behaviour of the accused and that its interpretation of the law was not proper. The metropolitan court intended to frame charges against the accused in this case.

Hardik Patel still has at least a dozen cases registered against him including one in which he is accused of sedition.

The PAAS convenor in 2015 spearheaded a quota agitation to seek reservation in government jobs and colleges for the Patidar or Patel community under the other backward classes category. The agitation turned violent in August 2015 and 15 people lost their lives.

There were 537 FIRs filed across the state during the rioting in 2015 where public property worth ₹44.5 crore was damaged.

Hardik Patel won a reprieve from the Supreme Court on April 12 when the top court stayed his conviction in a rioting and arson case registered against him in connection with the Patidar protests. The stay will enable Patel to contest the assembly elections.

Patel was among the two people convicted in 2018 by a court in Gujarat’s Mehsana district for offences of rioting, dacoity and arson for ransacking a BJP legislator’s office in Visnagar.

Patel was sentenced to two years imprisonment, which is the minimum benchmark set under Section 8 of the Representation of Peoples Act, 1951to disqualify a person from contesting elections for the next six years. The legal bar can be overcome on an acquittal from the case or by obtaining a stay on conviction, an order which is rarely issued by the higher courts. The Gujarat high court had turned down his request to stay the conviction in March 2019.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Maulik Pathak
He is an Ahmedabad-based journalist with more than two decades of experience. His career spans business journalism and general news, with reporting across politics, crime, governance, public policy, business, industry, infrastructure, energy, ports, aviation, the environment, wildlife and social issues. He began his career in feature writing before moving into business journalism, reporting on companies and sectors including energy, infrastructure, pharmaceuticals, automobiles and real estate. Over the years, his work expanded to politics, courts, crime, public policy, civic affairs, the environment and wildlife. His reporting has taken him from government offices and courtrooms to factory floors, ports, forests and remote villages, covering stories that range from industrial investments and financial markets to elections, conservation and issues affecting everyday life. While many assignments demand the pace of the daily news cycle, others require sustained reporting over months and years to follow developments beyond the headlines. He started his journalism career with the Asian Age in Ahmedabad in 2002 as a feature writer and sub-editor. Since 2022, he has been working with Hindustan Times. Earlier, he worked with Business Standard, DNA, The Economic Times, Mint and The Times of India. His longest stint was with Mint, where he spent more than eight years reporting across multiple beats. During his career, he has worked in both reporting and editing roles, contributing to page planning, local editions and special editorial projects as newsrooms evolved from print-first operations to digital publishing. Early in his career, he also worked on media and documentary projects with an NGO and as a copywriter at a communications agency before returning to journalism. Away from work, he sometimes makes time for a pair of binoculars, table tennis, cinema and the occasional poem.Read More

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