New Delhi: Minutes after AltNews Co-founder Mohammed Zubair secured bail from Supreme Court in all cases registered against him, Twitter users welcomed the journalist back and hashtags #MohammedZubair and #WelcomeBack were soon trending on the micro-blogging site.

User trolled right-wing activists and journalists who had called for Zubair’s arrest and were opposing bail to the fact-checker.

Senior Editor of The Wire, Arfa Khanum tweeted and called Zubair a hero while another reputed journalist Rajdeep Sardesai said the Court’s order is a strong message for cops and their political masters.

Several other journalists, activists, and users also took to their respective handles and welcomed back Zubair.

Earlier in the day, the Supreme Court granted bail to Zubair in all the cases registered over his 2018 tweet. The SC also refused the prosecution’s plea to restrict Zubair from tweeting.

In what came as a surprise to the right-wing fringe elements, the SC also clubbed and transferred UP Police’s FIRs to Delhi and disbanded the UP SIT set up to probe the matter. It also ordered his release before 6 pm on Wednesday subject to Zubair furnishing Rs. 20,000 bail bonds.

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Pathanamthitta(Kerala) (PTI): A Kerala court on Wednesday granted bail to expelled Congress MLA Rahul Mamkootathil in the third sexual assault case against him, in which he was arrested earlier this month.

The bail was granted by the Pathanamthitta District Sessions Court, which was considering an appeal filed by the MLA against a judicial magistrate's court that had denied him relief, stating that the allegations against him were serious and that he had "similar antecedents".

The third sexual assault case was registered against the Palakkad MLA under Sections 376 (rape) and 506(1) (criminal intimidation) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC), following a complaint lodged by a woman from Kottayam district on 8 January. He was arrested in the case on January 11 in Palakkad.

The Kerala High Court and a sessions court in Thiruvananthapuram had earlier protected the MLA from arrest in the first two sexual assault cases, which were registered based on complaints from two different women.