Terming it a fit case to prevent the "abuse of the process of law" and stating that it cannot be ruled out that “the FIR is politically motivated,” the Punjab and Haryana High court Monday stayed the arrest of former AAP leader Kumar Vishwas in a case registered against him in Punjab's Rupnagar over alleged "inflammatory statements" against Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal. Vishwas, who is also a poet, was booked by the Rupnagar police after an AAP worker had claimed that on April 12, when he was visiting villages along with party supporters for the redress of people's grievances, 10-12 unknown masked men stopped them and called them Khalistani. This started after Vishwas gave "inflammatory statements" against AAP national convener Arvind Kejriwal on news channels and social media platforms alleging links with separatist elements, the complainant alleged. Vishwas, through his counsel, Senior Advocates Randeep Rai and Chetan Mittal, along with Mayank Aggarwal and Rubina had moved the High Court last week, seeking stay on arrest and the quashing of the FIR registered against him. A single bench of Justice Anoop Chitkara in its order observed that the penal provisions under which the petitioner stands arraigned are not prima facie made out against him. "The submission that the FIR is politically motivated cannot be ruled out," the Bench said. "Even if all allegations made in the complaint and the prompt investigation, which has covered almost all aspects, are hypothetically believed as gospel truth, still prima facie the evidence collected does not disclose the commission of any cognizable offence qua the petitioner," the HC said. "The filing of the complaint by naming petitioner as the principal accused does not appear to have been done to seek action against the legal injury," observed the court. The court said, "a perusal of the complaint and the investigation do not point out that the interviews of the petitioner triggered the incident". The bench said that the complainant has clubbed an incident which occurred at a different place, under a different scenario, on a much earlier date, with the incident of April 12 in Rupnagar. “The lack of proximity between the two and the fact that the petitioner (Vishwas) was indisputably not one of the 10-12 unknown persons, who allegedly waylaid the complainant, cannot be ignored. A perusal of the complaint and the investigation do not point out that the interviews of the petitioner triggered the incidents of Chamkaur Sahib or of April 12, as a domino effect. The arraigning of petitioner by linking his interviews with the stray incident occurring after eight weeks, falls in the category of the exceptional cases where non-interference would result in a miscarriage of justice”, observed Justice Chitkara. "In the light of the judicial precedents, and the observations made above, it is a fit case for this court to prevent the abuse of the process of law because the allegations made in the complaint and the investigation carried out by associating the spot witnesses do not contain any material which even remotely links the incident of April 12 with the interviews of the petitioner," the court said. "Given above, further proceedings qua the petitioner, including arrest of Kumar Vishwas shall remain stayed,” said the court order. Directing the state to file reply within four weeks, the court fixed July 4 as the next date of hearing. The case was lodged against Vishwas in the Rupnagar's Sadar police station on April 12. The former AAP leader ahead of the Assembly elections had accused Kejriwal of supporting separatists. Vishwas was booked under Sections 120-B (criminal conspiracy), 153-A (promoting enmity between different groups on grounds of religion, race, place etc), 505 (whoever makes, publishes or circulates any statement, rumour or report) of the IPC and 125 of the Representation of People Act. The Punjab Police on April 20 had visited Vishwas's home in Ghaziabad and summoned him for questioning. In his petition, Vishwas had submitted that the case registered against him by the Rupnagar police was a "sheer abuse of process of law and apparently politically motivated". "The manner in which the investigating agency is proceeding, it is apparent that the investigating agency is trying to curtail the liberty of the petitioner by adopting a procedure unknown to law," Vishwas submitted.
