Muzaffarpur: An FIR was lodged here on Thursday against nearly 50 celebrities, including Ramachandra Guha, Mani Ratnam and Aparna Sen, who had written an open letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi raising concern over the growing incidents of mob lynching, police said.
The case was lodged after an order was passed by Chief Judicial Magistrate Surya Kant Tiwari two months ago on a petition filed by local advocate Sudhir Kumar Ojha.
“The CJM had passed the order on August 20, accepting my petition upon the receipt of which an FIR was lodged today at the Sadar police station here,” Ojha said.
He said nearly 50 signatories of the letter were named as accused in his petition in which they allegedly “tarnished the image of the country and undermined the impressive performance of the prime minister” besides “supporting secessionist tendencies”.
The police said the FIR was lodged under sections of the Indian Penal Code, including those relating to sedition, public nuisance, hurting religious feelings and insulting with an intent to provoke breach of peace.
The letter was written by 49 eminent personalities, including filmmakers Mani Ratnam, Anurag Kashyap, Shyam Benegal, actor Soumitra Chatterjee as well as vocalist Shubha Mudgal in July this year.
It had said that the lynching of Muslims, Dalits and other minorities must be stopped immediately, while stressing that there was “no democracy without dissent”.
It also noted that Jai Shri Ram had been reduced to a “provocative war cry”.
Also read: We can’t talk about Gandhi if we don’t speak up on Kashmir and lynchings
Hi, These are idiots, should be punished, free speech democratic country, a lawyer who feels these idiots are not supporting the country, needs to be prosecuted, he is doing the right thing… fuck the dummy secularists.
Image of the country has already been tarnished. News of various lynchings have been all over the TV and newspapers. Do the staff members of foreign embassies not read or view these media outlets, and wouldn’t they have already informed their respective governments and press back home? Hasn’t the foreign press been reporting these incidents independently on their own? So how have these 49 eminent persons in India done the image tarnishing bit? Their letter to the PM was to urge him to take steps, so this maligning the name of our country can stop. Obviously, the PM cannot stop the foreign press and foreign embassies from doing their duty. The 49 people were only requesting him to do what is within his powers to do – – to stop lynchings. But if the PM doesn’t want to play ball, then it’s actually he who is tarnishing the image of our country!!!
I wanted to make a comment but realized discretion is the better part of valour.