‘No offence made out’: Supreme Court clears Delhi Deputy CM Parvesh Verma and BJP’s Anurag Thakur in 2020 hate speech case

“Upon a careful consideration of the material placed on record, including the alleged speeches, the status report dated February 26, 2020, submitted before the trial court, and the reasons recorded by the courts below, we are in agreement with the conclusion that no cognizable offence is made out,” the bench said in its order Wednesday.

The petition said that on January 27, 2020, Thakur made a hate speech at a rally, shouting the slogan “desh ke gaddaron ko” and exhorting the crowd to respond with “goli maaro saalon ko”.

It also alleged that on January 28, 2020, Verma made inflammatory hate speeches while campaigning for the BJP. It also cited an interview in which he threatened use of force to remove protesters at Shaheen Bagh.

The petitioners said they initially approached the Delhi Police Commissioner and the Parliament Street SHO to seek registration of FIRs against the two leaders. When the police refused to register an FIR, they moved the Rouse Avenue court of Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate (I).

According to the petitioners, their complaint was dismissed on August 26, 2020, by the lower court which held it was not maintainable in law in the absence of prior sanction from the competent authority to prosecute the named accused.

On June 13, 2022, the Delhi High Court rejected Karat and Tiwari’s pleas for registration of hate speech FIRs against the two BJP leaders, observing that “the statements were not directed against any specific community nor did they incite violence or public disorder”.

The High Court also said that in respect of offences falling within the ambit of Section 196 of the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC), the power under Section 156(3) of CrPC to direct registration of an FIR and investigation could not be exercised in the absence of prior sanction.

The Supreme Court, however, disagreed with this reasoning of the lower court and the High Court. It said the requirement of prior sanction arises only at the stage of the magistrate taking cognizance, not before.

“The scheme of CrPC does not contemplate any embargo on the direction for registration of an FIR or the conduct of investigation at the pre-cognizance stage. To hold otherwise would amount to introducing a restriction not envisaged by the legislature. The process of criminal law is sequential: information of a cognizable offence must first be received; an FIR must then be registered; investigation must follow; a report under Section 173 of CrPC must thereafter be submitted; and it is only at that stage that the question of taking cognizance arises,” the bench said.

“The position of law, as crystallised by this Court, is unequivocal. Where information discloses the commission of a cognizable offence, registration of an FIR is mandatory. The police, in such circumstances, have no discretion in the matter, either under the statutory scheme or by way of interpretative latitude,” it said.

“Failure on the part of the authorities to perform their statutory duties at the threshold stage not only defeats the legislative intent but also places the ordinary citizen in a position of vulnerability against institutional inaction. The rule of law mandates that the machinery of investigation be set in motion in accordance with law, uninfluenced by extraneous considerations,” the bench said.