NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Thursday barred the registration of any new FIRs against Tamil Nadu Deputy Chief Minister Udhayanidhi Stalin over his remarks on Sanatana Dharma, without its prior permission. A two-judge bench of CJI Sanjiv Khanna and Justice Sanjay Kumar passed the interim order while hearing the DMK leader’s plea to club multiple FIRs filed against him across the country.
“List for hearing in April. The interim order shall continue and apply to any new cases added as well. No further FIR shall be registered on the same cause,” the court ordered. The directive came after Udhayanidhi’s counsel informed the bench that a fresh FIR had been registered against him in Bihar.
The case pertains to a speech Udhaya made in September 2023 at a conference in Chennai, where he compared Sanatana Dharma to diseases like dengue and malaria and called for its eradication. Following this, multiple FIRs were lodged against him in different states.
Udhayanidhi then approached the apex court seeking the consolidation of these cases, arguing that his speech was made in a “closed-door event” before an “ideologically aligned audience”. Citing Articles 19(1)(a) and 25 of the Constitution, he requested that the FIRs be transferred to a single jurisdiction.
Opposing the plea, Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, representing Maharashtra, contended that had a chief minister spoken similarly about any other religion, there would have been severe repercussions.
Senior advocates Abhishek Manu Singhvi and P Wilson, representing Udhayanidhi, argued that his comments should be viewed in the context of caste-based discrimination. Singhvi pointed out that in past cases involving figures like Arnab Goswami and Nupur Sharma, FIRs had been transferred first. In May 2024, the Supreme Court had issued notices to multiple state governments and complainants seeking their response to Udhayanathi’s plea.