Allahabad High Court dismisses plea filed Against CM Yogi's Alwar Speech; imposes Rs 5k cost

The Allahabad High Court today dismissed the plea seeking direction for registration of a complaint against Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath for his alleged "objectionable speech" made in the Alwar district of Rajasthan in 2018 during an election campaign.

The bench of Justice Samit Gopal had reserved the judgment on Tuesday, September 27 in the plea filed by one Naval Kishor Sharma through Advocate Mohammed Iftekhar Farruki challenging the order of the lower court.

Earlier, a complaint case was filed by the petitioner in the Mau district of Uttar Pradesh which was rejected. Thereafter, his revision petition was also rejected on the ground of territorial jurisdiction after which the petitioner moved the high court.

The High Court observed that despite there having been a concurrent finding by two courts with regards to the question of territorial jurisdiction of the Mau court, the petitioner/complainant who is an advocate by profession, approached the high court.

Court said that by looking to the facts and circumstances of the case, it was clear that "the Court at Mau had no territorial jurisdiction to entertain the said complaint".

Therefore, court opined that "the petitioner/complainant clearly abused the process of law" and imposed a token cost of Rs. 5,000 on him to be paid within 30 days from today in the Mediation and Conciliation Centre of the high court for utilization therein.

Adv. Farruki on behalf of the petitioner had argued that CM Yogi Adityanath's speech made in Alwar on November 28, 2018, had hurt his religious sentiments.

He had alleged that CM Yogi had stated certain words for Lord Bajrangbali due to which the religious sentiments of public who are followers of Sri Bajrangbali had been hurt.

Case Title: Naval Kishor Sharma v. State of U.P. and Another