LUCKNOW: An FIR has been lodged against unidentified persons at the Gomti Nagar police station under various sections of the IPC and Section 66 of the Information Technology Act, 2008, for allegedly using derogatory language and defamatory remarks against the judges of the Allahabad High Court following their order to remove the hoardings featuring anti-CAA protesters.
The FIR has been registered under Section 500 (defamation), Section 507 (criminal intimidation by anonymous communication) of the IPC and Section 66 of the IT Amendment Act -2008 for circulating offensive messages.
The complainant in the case, RTI activist Nutan Thakur, alleged that derogatory remarks were made on social media, especially on Twitter, against the honourable judges of the Allahabad High Court. The complainant also alleged that an article was published on a Hindi website targeting the judges and making personal comments on them.
In her complaint, Thakur claimed that the remarks named the justices and blamed them for promoting riots instead of protecting the law. The complainant also said that the judges were accused of passing the order with malafide intention on various social media sites including Facebook and WhatsApp.
The High Court had on Monday ordered Lucknow's District Magistrate and Police Commissioner to remove the ‘name-and-shame’ hoardings with immediate effect, and submit the compliance report on the matter by March 16.
The two-judge division bench, comprising Chief Justice Govind Mathur and Justice Ramesh Sinha, had observed on Monday that the district administration was backed by no law to put up photographs of the alleged accused persons since it amounted to an infringement of their personal liberty and was a violation of Article 21 of the Constitution.