Actress Kangana Ranaut told Mumbai High Court on Monday, through her lawyer, that none of her tweets had incited violence or caused any criminal act, and she sought to overturn the FIR registered against her for sedition by police in Mumbai.
The HC will continue to hear the arguments on February 26 and the provisional protection against arrest granted to Ranaut and her sister Rangoli will continue until then.
Ranaut’s lawyer, Rizwan Siddique, told Judges SS Shinde and Manish Pitale that the actress had not made any mistakes through her tweets.
He said the magistrates court in the Bandra suburbs had erred in allowing the registration of a First Information Report (FIR) against Ranaut on charges that included sedition.
Siddique urged the High Court to vacate the lower court order as well as the FIR.
‘There is an absolute non-application of the mind in the court order (Bandra). Even the sections invoked against me do not constitute a crime. None of my tweets have elicited public reactions. They will not attract punishment as they were not followed by violence. What happened after the tweet? Was there any criminal act after my tweets? Siddique told the HC on behalf of Ranaut.
The actress and her sister Rangoli had challenged the lower court order to initiate criminal proceedings against them and the subsequent subpoena issued by the Mumbai police.
The FIR registered against Ranaut and Rangoli in October last year on instructions from the magistrates court after Munawwar Ali Sayyad, casting director and physical trainer, filed a complaint citing some tweets and statements allegedly made by Ranaut and her sister.
In an affidavit filed at the HC earlier this month, Sayyad had said that, among other things, Ranaut and Rangoli promoted “hatred and contempt, and incited discontent towards the government of Maharashtra”, through their tweets. .
He said in the affidavit that therefore the lower court was justified in ordering the police to initiate proceedings and invoke the crime of sedition under section 124A of the Indian Penal Code against them.
In his complaint to the trial court, Sayyed had alleged that Ranaut, through his tweets and television interviews, had continuously defamed the Hindi film industry by portraying Bollywood as a center of nepotism, favoritism, drug addicts, prejudiced people community and murderers, etc.
He said that Ranaut and Rangoli had also repeatedly promoted enmity between the communities through their comments.
However, Ranaut’s attorney, Siddique, denied these allegations on Monday.
He told the HC that the Bandra court had not followed due procedure and had not applied its mind in allowing the police to initiate an action against Ranaut and his sister.
At the beginning of last month, Sayyad had also filed an application requesting the initiation of contempt proceedings against Ranaut for allegedly violating a previous commitment he had given to the HC.
He said in his guilty plea that on November 24, Ranaut had promised not to make any statements related to the Mumbai police investigation into the sedition case brought against him.
However, on January 8, just before going to the police station, Ranaut tweeted a video in which he spoke to his fans about the investigation, Sayyad had said.
The HC is listening to Ranaut’s statement against the Bandra court and Sayyad’s request for contempt together.
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She is a freelance blogger, writer, and speaker, and writes for various entertainment magazines.