Merely showing support for Pakistan not offence under section 152 of BNS: Allahabad HC
Prayagraj (UP), Jul 11 (PTI): The Allahabad High Court has observed that merely expressing support for Pakistan, without referring to any specific incident or mentioning India by name, does not prima facie constitute an offence under section 152 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS).
The said penal provision deals with acts endangering the sovereignty or unity and integrity of India.
"Considering the submissions of the learned counsel for the parties and after a perusal of the records, it is not in dispute that while posting the aforesaid post through his Instagram ID, the applicant had not mentioned anything which shows disrespect towards our country.
"Merely showing support to Pakistan, without referring to any incident or mentioning the name of India, will not prima facie attract the offence under section 152, BNS," Justice Arun Kumar Singh Deshwal said while allowing the bail plea of one Riyaz.
The applicant's counsel submitted that the said social media post of the applicant did not lower the dignity and sovereignty of India as neither the Indian flag nor the country's name or any photo, which showed disrespect to the country, was shared.
Merely supporting a country, even if that country is an enemy of India, will not attract the ingredients of section 152 of the BNS, the lawyer said.
In its order dated July 10, the court said, "Section 152, BNS is a new section providing stringent punishment and there was no corresponding section in the IPC. Therefore, before invoking section 152, BNS, reasonable care and the standards of a reasonable person should be adopted as spoken words or posts on social media are also covered by the liberty of freedom of speech and expression, which should not be narrowly construed unless those are of such nature that affects the sovereignty and integrity of a country or encourages separatism."
Allowing the bail plea, the court observed, "For attracting the ingredients of section 152, BNS, there must be purpose by spoken or written words, signs, visible representations, electronic communication to promote secession, an armed rebellion, subversive activities or encourage the feeling of separating activities or endanger the sovereignty, unity and integrity of India."
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TMC MP Saket Gokhale slams Bihar electoral roll revision, claims 1.26 crore voters 'deleted'
New Delhi(PTI): Trinamool Congress MP Saket Gokhale on Monday said 1.26 crore voters have been "deleted" from Bihar's electoral rolls following the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) exercise and challenged the government to a debate on the issue in Parliament.
Sharing the Election Commission's SIR data in a post on X, Gokhale said the poll panel "conveniently" did not share any information regarding its claim of having found foreign nationals in Bihar.
As the month-long first phase of the SIR has concluded, the EC on Sunday said that enumeration forms from 7.24 crore or 91.69 per cent of voters of the state have been received.
It also said 36 lakh people were found to have either permanently shifted from their previous addresses or were not found. It pointed out that seven lakh Bihar voters were found to have enrolled themselves at multiple places.
"ECI has deleted 1.26 crore voters in Bihar from the 2024 Lok Sabha voter list overnight," Gokhale, the TMC Rajya Sabha MP, said on X.
Calling the details revealed by the EC "bizarre", Gokhale pointed out that of a total of 7.90 crore voters, forms have been collected from only 91.69 per cent -- 7.24 crore voters.
"This means that forms were not collected from 65 lakh voters, and they will be deleted. About 22 lakh voters (2.83 per cent) have been deleted because they're claimed to be deceased, about 36 lakh voters (4.59 per cent) have been deleted because they're claimed to be untraceable, and about 7 lakh voters (0.89 per cent) claimed to be found as duplicate entries so half i.e. 3.5 lakh entries deleted," he said.
"ECI has conveniently not disclosed how many voters were found to be non-citizens of India. This is important because ECI had claimed that the SIR was being done to 'remove illegal immigrants'," Gokhale said.
EC sources had earlier said their field-level functionaries found "a large number of people" from Nepal, Bangladesh and Myanmar during house-to-house visits made for the ongoing intensive review of the voters' list in Bihar.
Gokhale further said the names "deleted" were on the voters' list in the last Lok Sabha polls.
"A total of 1.26 crore voters in Bihar, whose names were on the Lok Sabha 2024 voter list just one year ago, have been deleted from the new voter list," he said.
"To give you a comparable idea, the number of deleted voters in Bihar during the current SIR is equal to the entire combined population of Uttarakhand plus Himachal Pradesh or the entire combined population of all 6 states of the North-East (excluding Assam)," he said.
He said EC needed to answer some questions "urgently".
"The voter list was revised by ECI before the 2024 Lok Sabha elections. How on earth did 1.26 crore voters become ineligible in just one year?" he said.
"How many voters has the ECI been unable to reach for collecting their forms? Under the rules of SIR, those whose forms were not collected will be deleted. Therefore, what is the total number of voters whose names have been deleted only because their forms were not collected?" he questioned.
He said the EC has not collected documents along with the forms from all 7.24 crore voters.
"Does this mean that more voters will be deleted if their documents have not been collected with their forms?"
He reiterated West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee's statement that the SIR exercise "is NRC by the back door".
"ECI had claimed 'removing foreigners from the voter list' as one of the reasons for conducting this SIR. Why has the ECI not disclosed how many actual 'foreigners' were found and deleted from the voter list during this SIR?" he said.
"It makes zero sense that 12 million people in Bihar have become 'ineligible' voters in just one year between the 2024 Lok Sabha elections till date... When 12 million people in a single state lose the right to vote overnight, it is a serious issue," he said.
He added that the opposition MPs have been pressing for a debate on the issue.
"Why is the Modi Govt so scared to have an open discussion on this in Parliament?" he added.
Meanwhile, the EC has asserted that no names will be deleted from draft rolls without following due process.
VERY IMPORTANT AND SHOCKING
— Saket Gokhale MP (@SaketGokhale) July 28, 2025
ECI has deleted 1.26 CRORE voters in Bihar from the 2024 Lok Sabha voter list OVERNIGHT
Last night, the ECI published details of ongoing "special intensive revision" of the electoral roll being conducted in Bihar. The deadline for collection of forms… pic.twitter.com/E7x2egYfCw
