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Himachal Pradesh High Court: Holding Peaceful Protest is Not an Offence
The bench of Justice Anoop Chitkara quashed an FIR that was filed against an advocate named Anu Tuli Azta who is a member of the Shimla District Courts Bar Association under Sections 143, 147, 149, 341, 353, 504, and 506 of the IPC. The court held that peaceful processions and raising slogans cannot and would not be an offense under the Constitution of India.
The petitioner stated that lawyers were peacefully protesting against the authorities restricting the entry to the District Court Complex of Shimla from a shorter route which was causing traffic jams as everyone was forced to take the same longer route. It was also mentioned that the police had fabricated the FIR with malicious intentions to suppress the agitation and named the lady advocate as an accused because she was supporting the protest.
The prosecution argued that a large number of advocates had amassed at the Boileauganj Bazar of Shimla Town and were insisting on taking the restricted shorter route without any valid permit. The Station House Officer reached the place and asked the advocates the reason for the protest, including Tuli Azta. Moreover, when they were asked for permits to use the restricted road, the advocates allegedly became aggressive and started verbally abusing, pushing, and physically hurting the police officials. The SHO claimed that he tried to calm the protesters but they kept doing the activities mentioned above and even threatened to burn the police station and allegedly also told the SHO that they 'will teach him a lesson he would never forget in his whole life' after which a complaint was registered against the petitioner and other lawyers.
The court observed that the FIR nowhere mentioned the role of the petitioner in violence against the police officials. Furthermore, although the police had a video recording of the incident, the respondents did not mention the time stamp in the video where the petitioner was allegedly involved in such activities. Hence, the charges against her were quashed.
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