Read Time: 06 minutes

The Delhi High Court has issued notice to the Delhi Police on the plea filed by Mohammad Zubair, co-founder of fact checking website Alt News. 

Zubair was arrested on Monday, June 27 by the Special Cell of Delhi Police and was produced before the Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Snigdha Savaria on Tuesday, where he had opposed the remand and also moved a bail application. 

A single judge bench of Justice Sanjeev Narula has directed the matter to be heard by the lower court, without prejudice to the pendency of the matter before the High Court.

The matter before the lower court is listed on July 2, whereas the present petition before the Delhi High Court is to be heard on July 27, which is the next date of hearing. 

High Court has also directed the Delhi Police to file its response within two weeks and has asked Zubair to file a rejoinder within one week thereafter. 

Background:

On June 28, a Delhi court had remanded Zubair to police custody for a period of four days for allegedly hurting religious sentiment and for promoting enmity between groups. 

The FIR against Zubair has been filed under IPC Sections 153A (promoting enmity between different groups) and 295A (malicious acts, intended to outrage religious feelings). 

The complaint related to a tweet he made by him in 2018. The FIR registered against him reportedly alleges that the tweet he made was "highly provocative and more than sufficient to incite feelings of hatred". In the tweet Zubair has shown a photo of a hotel board that reads "Hanuman Hotel" in Hindi. The paint marks on the board suggest that it was earlier called "Honeymoon Hotel" but the name was later changed to "Hanuman Hotel". The photo was tweeted by Zubair with the caption "Before 2014: Honeymoon Hotel, After 2014: Hanuman Hotel". 

After his arrest Zubair was produced before the Court of Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Snigdha Savaria for arguments on bail. 

The Delhi Police had argued that Zubair refused to cooperate in the investigation and has also deleted all the applications on his mobile phone including Twitter. Delhi Police also argued that there were several FIRs against him for such posts and he was a continuing offender who had a tendency to deliberately offend religious sentiments.

Court was further informed by the Delhi Police that in order to seize his laptop and other electronic devices, Zubair needed to be kept in remand. 

Appearing for Zubair, Advocate Vrinda Grover, had argued that police remand cannot be mechanical.

The Delhi Police had sought custody of his laptop, which was never part of the investigation, Grover said.

She further submitted that even courts cannot grant access to something that is not part of the investigation. The Delhi Police, she contended, had already seized the accused's phone and there is no reason for seizing his laptop which he does not use for making tweets.

After hearing arguments advanced by both sides, the Delhi Court had remanded Zubair to four days' police custody. 

Case Title: Mohammad Zubair vs State of NCT of Delhi