New Delhi: A Delhi court on Friday rejected Delhi Law Minister Kapil Mishra's plea against the summons issued for making objectionable statements and violating the model code of conduct during the 2020 Delhi elections.
Special judge Jitendra Singh observed the Election Commission of India was under a constitutional obligation to prevent the candidates from indulging in "vitriolic vituperation with impunity, vitiating and contaminating the atmosphere for free and fair elections."
Mishra is accused of posting objectionable statements on social media, specifically on his Twitter handle, during the 2020 Delhi legislative assembly elections. The posts in question were made on January 23, 2020, and sparked a complaint from the returning officer, which ultimately led to an FIR being filed.
The judge said he was in complete agreement with the magisterial court stating that the complaint filed by the returning officer was sufficient to take cognisance of the offence under Section 125 of the Representation of the People (RP) Act. This section deals with promoting enmity between classes in connection with the election.
Mishra's statements, the court said, appeared to be "a brazen attempt to promote enmity on the grounds of religion by way of indirectly referring to a country that, unfortunately, in common parlance is often used to denote the members of a particular religion."
"The word Pakistan is very skilfully weaved by the revisionist in his alleged statements to spew hatred, careless of the communal polarisation that may ensue in the election campaign, only to garner votes," it said.
The court dismissed Kapil Mishra's argument as "simply preposterous and outrightly untenable" that his statement didn't target any specific caste, community, religion, race, or language, but rather referred to a country, which he claimed wasn't prohibited under Section 125 of the RP Act.
The court ruled that Kapil Mishra's statement implicitly referred to a specific country, which was an "unmistaken innuendo" targeting a particular religious community. The court emphasised that this inference was obvious and could be easily understood by anyone, stating that it was "effortlessly understood even by a layman, let alone by a reasonable man.".
Accepting Mishra's argument that Section 125 of the RP Act was not attracted would be a "blatant negation of, and brutal violence with, the spirit underlying the provision," the court said.
"One cannot be allowed to do something that has been prohibited by Section 125 of the RP Act, indirectly, if he cannot do it directly," it added.
(inputs from PTI)