Kolkata, February 16 – A single-judge bench of the Calcutta High Court raised concerns on Monday about the overly aggressive actions taken by the Krishnanagar Police in the Nadia district of West Bengal against an individual over a social media post involving Mahua Moitra, a Member of Parliament from the Trinamool Congress constituency of Krishnanagar.
The individual, Rishi Bagri, approached the single-judge bench of Justice Jay Sengupta and accused the police of hastily registering an FIR and then taking aggressive action against him simply because the FIR was registered by a Member of Parliament from the ruling Trinamool Congress in the state.
The matter came up for hearing on Monday.
The petitioner's lawyer told the court that the Krishnanagar Kotwali Police Station registered the FIR based on a complaint filed via email at 3:25 a.m. on February 7.
In the complaint, the petitioner was accused of making a social media post involving Mahua Moitra, which, according to the complaint, was "disrespectful," "derogatory," and "sexually suggestive."
Based on the complaint, the police registered the FIR under various sections of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023.
On Monday, the petitioner's lawyer told the court that, according to the rule, if a complaint is filed digitally, the complainant is required to appear physically at the concerned police stations and sign the complaint.
"In this case, even after three days, there was no signature of the complainant on the complaint. Then how was the FIR registered? Furthermore, the police reached the house of the accused in Noida in Uttar Pradesh, the very next day after the complaint was registered, which is a sign of illegal and unusual activity on the part of the police," the petitioner's lawyer said.
Although, the petitioner had not sought anticipatory bail in the matter, he had approached the Calcutta High Court to have the FIR altogether scrapped.
The state government's lawyer sought more time to argue his points.
Justice Sengupta fixed February 19 as the next date of hearing in the matter and directed the state police not to initiate any coercive action against the petitioner in the matter.
At the same time, Justice Sengupta raised the question of whether such overly aggressive action by the state police was due to the fact that the complaint came from a ruling Trinamool Congress MP.