On 5th January, the Lucknow bench of the Allahabad High Court dismissed the plea submitted by two accused of burning copies of Ramcharitmanas. The accused, identified as Devendra Pratap Yadav and Suresh Singh Yadav, were arrested under the National Security Act (NSA). They filed a plea in the court to quash the detention order.
A division bench comprising Justice Narendra Kumar Johri and Justice Sangeeta Johri dismissed the petitions. In its order, the court said that the petitioners and their associates insulted the religious text Ramcharitmanas, related to the life events of Bhagwan Ram, who is worshipped by a significant section of society. The court added that the anger generated due to their actions was natural, hence invoking the NSA was justified.
Furthermore, the court said that in such a situation where the accused were detained given impending danger, it could not be considered an unjustified and illegal restriction on the personal freedom of the accused.
Burning of Ramcharitmanas
On 29th January 2023, Akhil Bharatiya OBC Mahasabha members burnt pages of Ramcharitmanas in the Vrindavan area. An FIR was registered against ten people, including Swami Prasad Maurya, MLC of Samajwadi Party. Following the incident, NSA was invoked against Mohammad Salim, Satyendra Kushwaha, Yashpal Singh, Devendra Yadav and Suresh Yadav and were arrested.
They were booked under Sections 295, 153A, and 506 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC). Additionally, Maurya was booked under Section 120B of the IPC. The FIR was registered against the accused on the complaint of Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Satnam Singh Lavi.
The 29th January incident took place during a protest organised to show support for Maurya, who had said in a statement that Ramcharitmanas contained passages discriminatory to Dalits, tribals, people from the backward community and women.