Mumbai: An engineering student spent nearly 20 days in Pune’s Yerwada jail, was expelled by her college, and missed her exam over resharing a social media post, allegedly critical of India’s Operation Sindoor. On Tuesday, the Bombay High Court granted her relief by ordering her immediate release on bail, and asking her college, the Sinhgad Academy of Engineering, to suspend her expulsion with immediate effect.
The student is currently in her fourth semester in the college affiliated to Savitribai Phule Pune University. According to the court, which called the case “absolutely shocking”, the student had taken the post down within two hours, and apologised for it. She should have not been taken into custody in the first place, the court observed.
The allegedly objectionable post on Instagram was not created by her, but was shared from someone else’s post, according to the FIR.
Granting the 19-year-old relief, the court said, “There is no dispute that immediately within two hours, the petitioner deleted the post and she publicly expressed remorse and tendered an apology…According to us, it is thus shocking that after she deleted the post, the FIR was lodged against her on 9 May, 2025.”
The Pune Police’s Kondhwa station had registered an FIR against the student under sections of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS) dealing with endangering the sovereignty, integrity and unity of India, promoting enmity between different groups, and deliberate and malicious acts intended to outrage religious feelings, among others.
The student had approached the Bombay High Court requesting for the FIR against her to be quashed, and that she be given interim relief and released immediately.
The high court also ordered that the student be allowed to appear for her upcoming examinations on 29 May, 31 May and 3 June.
The student had already missed two exams on 24 and 27 May because she was in custody and was expelled from her college, the court noted. She had asked for permission to appear for the two missed exams.
However, the college said through its advocate that the exams are conducted by the university, and that the institution itself will not be able to independently take a decision about allowing her to appear for the two examinations.
What the FIR said
According to the case registered on 9 May, a constable on duty at the Kondhwa Police Station came across the student’s post on social media as a Whatsapp forward on one of the groups that he was part of. The original post was by a user called “Reformistan/Dr. Maarib” that she had reshared on her Instagram account, said the FIR, a copy of which ThePrint has seen.
Seeking her custody, Kondhwa Police told a Pune court that they needed to investigate the post’s origin, and also whether the student knew the person who had created the original post.
The post claimed that India had initiated a war between two nuclear nations, without evidence of Pakistan’s involvement in the Pahalgam terror attack. It also slammed the Indian government, calling it a “fascist regime”, and mentioned India’s alleged colonisation of Kashmir.
The FIR said that the student had shared the post on her Instagram account with the “intention of disturbing peace”.
In its order, a copy of which ThePrint has seen, the Bombay High Court, however, said it found no reason to detain her in judicial custody. Her act of sharing the post can at the most be termed as an “indiscretion by a young student who is still taking her education”, the ruling added.
The high court also slammed the college for rusticating her “hurriedly”, allegedly without giving her a hearing. “The order of rustication completely ignores the act of the applicant in deleting the post, expressing remorse and tendering an apology. Hence, we find that the order of rustication is required to be suspended,” the court said.
(Edited by Mannat Chugh)