FIR against Kangana, sister for ‘communal’ tweets, interviews
An FIR was registered against actor Kangana Ranaut and her sister Rangoli Chandel on Saturday, a day after the Bandra magistrate court directed the police to conduct investigations against the two for allegedly creating communal tension through tweets and interviews.
The Bandra police registered the FIR under Indian Penal Code Sections 124A (sedition), 153A (promoting enmity between different groups on grounds of religion), and 295A (deliberate and malicious acts intended to outrage religious feelings of any class by insulting their religion or religious beliefs). After the probe is completed, the police will have to submit a report before the court.
Munnawarali aka Sahil Ashrafali Sayyed, a feature film casting director, had submitted a private complaint before the Bandra magistrate court. The plea alleged that through her tweets, Ranaut was creating divisions between Hindu and Muslim artists.
In an order pronounced on Friday, metropolitan magistrate Jaydeo Y Ghule said, “On prima facie perusal of the complaint and submissions, I found the cognizable offense has been committed by the accused. Total allegations are based upon comments on electronic media ie tweets and interviews. The accused used social media like Twitter. Thorough investigations are necessary by the expert.”
Sayyed’s plea said that over the last couple of months, Kangana had been defaming Bollywood by calling it a hub of nepotism, favoritism, drug addicts, communally biased people, murderers, etc. “This is creating a very bad image of Bollywood in the minds of people and even creating a communal divide and rift between people of two communities and in the minds of the common man,” the plea said. He further said Ranaut had been “maliciously bringing religion in almost all her tweets” and cited several examples.
The plea said she too had made an objectionable tweet to spread communal hatred and animosity among the two religious communities. “I say that the said tweet was so objectionable from a communal point of view that her Twitter account was instantly deleted. I say that the tweet not only hurt my religious sentiments but also the religious sentiments of the Muslim community,” the plea said. The plea also cited Ranaut’s tweet against chief minister Uddhav Thackeray and a tweet calling Mumbai “POK (Pakistan Occupied Kashmir).”
Sayyed said that he had written to the police last month, but no action was taken. “Police investigation is necessary to ascertain the real motive behind such hate tweets and who are the people backing such hatred to create communal tensions and sentiments against the government,” the plea said.
The court said that all the alleged offenses against the accused are cognizable. “Search and seizure is necessary in this case. In such circumstances, I found it is proper to pass an order under Section 156 (3) (magistrate is empowered to order investigations) of the Criminal Procedure Code.”
