The Mumbai police told Bombay High Court that it won’t arrest Kangana Ranaut till January 25 in the FIR filed against her for her anti-Sikh Instagram post.
The state government gave the assurance reportedly after the actress agreed to show up at Khar police station on December 22 to record her statement with regard to an Instagram post she had made in connection with the farmers’ protest.
A bench of Justices Nitin Jamdar and Sarang Kotwal had also said that the issue involved the larger question of Kangana’s fundamental right to free speech and that the court will have to grant her some ad-interim relief.
Kangana had earlier approached the HC seeking that the FIR registered against her to be quashed. In her plea filed through advocate Rizwan Sidiquee, the actress stated that while the complainants took objection to her Instagram post made on November 21, there was no legal case made out against her.
The FIR was registered against her following a complaint made by some members of a Sikh body that claimed that the actress, through her Instagram post, had portrayed the farmers’ protest on Delhi borders as a Khalistani movement. The police had then reportedly booked her on charges of deliberately hurting the community’s religious sentiments under Section 295-A of the Indian Penal Code.
