Merely Hurling Religiously Compromised Expressions Not Sufficient To Attract Offence U/S 295A IPC: Punjab & Haryana HC

The Punjab and Haryana High Court clarified that for the offence under Section 295-A of the Indian Penal Code (IPC), intentional insult must be to provoke a person and merely hurling religiously compromised expressions is not sufficient.

The Court was deciding a criminal revision petition seeking setting aside of the order by which the cancellation report was accepted as well as the order by which the SDJM dismissed the complaint/protest petition.

A Single Bench of Justice Sandeep Moudgil observed, “Free speech enables individual autonomy, respect and well being through self-expression. … In fact, this Court is also cautious to the sensitivity but the same time has to look at the things rationally. The intentional insult must be of such a degree that should provoke a person to break the public peace or to commit any other offence. … One of the essential elements constituting the offence is that there should have been an act or conduct amounting to intentional insult and the mere fact that the accused hurled such religiously-compromised expressions to directly hurt the sentiments of the Sikh community, as such, is not sufficient by itself for this Court to direct the Magistrate to take cognizance of the same.”

The Bench said that the person who intentionally insults intending or knowing it to be likely that it will give provocation to any other person and such provocation will cause to break the public peace or to commit any other offence, in such a situation, the ingredients of Sections 295-A and 504 of IPC are satisfied.

Advocate Ramandeep Singh Gill represented the petitioners while Addl. AG ADS Sukhija represented the respondents.

In this case, a video went viral in which the accused who, while performing in one of the Programmes/Mela, stated Laddi Shah is the descendant of Sri Guru Amar Dass. Such an act of the accused, being actually and historically false, offended the religious sentiments of Sikh masses and a complaint for commission of offence punishable under Section 295-A IPC was filed by the petitioners. Thereafter, an FIR was lodged against the accused, however, a cancellation report was filed as a result of which the petitioners moved protest petition/complaint before SDJM. The same was dismissed, prompting the petitioners to approach the High Court.

The High Court in view of the above facts noted, “… there is a thin distinction between the two terms i.e. religion and religious belief, of which no interpretation so far is available except to understand that religious belief is a matter of subjective acceptance as the same may be believed by one individual but not by the others.”

The Court emphasised that whatever thinnest distinction can be edged out between the two i.e., religion and religious belief, one thing is common i.e. both are supposed to make life morally worth enduring and are not so brittle or fragile that they can be outraged or insulted by anyone as all religions preach compassion and forgiveness.

Furthermore, the Court referred to certain quotes from Shri Guru Granth Sahib Ji, telling the importance of forgiveness even to the person, who cause us hurts.

“… this Court does not find any valid or justifiable reason to interfere in the order of the trial court terming it to be illegal or not based on facts inasmuch as none of the essential ingredients to make out a case under Section 295-A IPC viz. (i) malicious & deliberate intention, (ii) outrage, (iii) insult or attempts to insult, (iv) the religion or the religious belief of that class are shown to have been made out against the accused Gurdas Mann and therefore, in this backdrop, the acceptance of cancellation report dated 29.11.2022 in respect of FIR No.141 dated 26.08.2021 under Section 295-A IPC, registered at Police Station Nakodar, District Jalandhar cannot be interfered with”, it added.

The Court also noted that there is no iota of evidence directly or indirectly suggesting that the accused forced any person or group of particular community as a whole forcing upon them to accept Laddi Shah as a descendant of Shri Guru Amar Das ji.

“Even otherwise, preaching and believing a religion is subjective to its followers or professors and no such malicious act intentionally and deliberatly is established on examination of the report submitted by the Inverstigating Agency and on minute and clinical scrutiny of material available before it which could be considered to say that the act of accused-Gurdas Maan is enough to outrage the religious sentiments of any other class or community as a whole”, it concluded.

Accordingly, the High Court dismissed the petition and refused to interfere with the impugned order.

Cause Title- Harjinder Singh @ Jinda & Ors. v. State of Punjab & Ors. (Neutral Citation: 2024:PHHC:080662)

Appearance:

Petitioners: Advocates Ramandeep Singh Gill and Jatin Bansal Kotshamir.

Respondents: Addl. AG ADS Sukhija and DAG JS Rattu.

Click here to read/download the Judgment