Read Time: 06 minutes

The District and Sessions Court, Haridwar has granted bail to Yati Narsinghanand, the head priest of Dasna Devi temple in Uttar Pradesh in a case registered against him for his alleged hate speeches against Muslims during the Haridwar “Dharam Sansad” that took place last month from December 17-19.

The Additional District and Sessions Judge, Bharat Bhushan Pandey noted in the order, 

"As far as the criminal history of the accused is concerned and the list of criminal cases filed before the Court by the investigator, the accused has not been convicted so far in any case and all the cases are at the stage of investigation, trial, charge. Trial is pending in the court. In such a situation, on the basis of the institution and sub-judice of the alleged criminal proceedings in other cases, instead of canceling the bail application of the accused in this case, bail is a rule and jail is an exception, following the laid down and well-established principle of law but keeping the strict restrictions, the acceptance of the bail application appears to be justified in the interest of justice at this stage."

Narsinghanand had moved the Sessions Court against the Chief Judicial Magistrate's order dated January 20, 2021.  In the instant case, he was arrested for offences under sections 153A and 295A of the Indian Penal Code. 

Narsinghanand's counsel, Advocate Narayan Har Gupta, had pressed before the Sessions Court that Narsinghanand had no role to play in the live telecast of the said event and the case was instituted by the informant on the basis of the video uploaded on Facebook, in which the accused had no contribution.

Taking note of this fact and the fact that Narsinghanand was not named in the FIR in the case and that he was later arrested under sections 153A and 295A  which are punishable with a maximum of 3 years of imprisonment, court concluded in favor of releasing him on bail. 

Court said, "In the above penal provisions, there is no solid ground before the court at this stage to deny bail to the accused as the case is punishable with maximum imprisonment of up to three years."

Matter in Brief

A complaint had been filed by one Gulbahar Khan alleging that during the religious meet, in the name of Dharma Sansad and in pursuance of the prior plan, objectionable and provocative statements against the Prophet Mohammad Sahib were made by Waseem Rizvi alias Jitendra Narayan Tyagi, etc. The complainant had also alleged that due to these speeches, which were also broadcast live on social media platform Facebook, the religious sentiments of the Khan and millions of other people who believe in Islam have been hurt.

It is to be noted that for his alleged offensive and provocative comments against the Muslim community, Jitendra Tyagi (earlier known as Waseem Rizvi) had been denied on bail by the District and Sessions Court, Haridwar on January 20.

Case Title: Yati Narsinghanand v. State