MCC violation case: posts aimed at Oppn. parties, Kapil Mishra tells court

Delhi Law Minister Kapil Mishra
| Photo Credit: FILE PHOTO

Delhi Law Minister Kapil Mishra, accused of violation of the model code of conduct (MCC) during the 2020 Assembly election for social media posts allegedly targeting the minority community, submitted in court on Tuesday that they were aimed at the Opposition parties, not Muslims.

The Minister made the submissions before the court of Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate (ACJM) Vaibhav Chaurasia of the Rouse Avenue Courts during arguments on the framing of charges against him.

Senior advocate Pawan Narang, arguing on behalf of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader, said that his client’s posts did not target any individual based on religion or language but rather rival parties Congress and Aam Aadmi Party. He added that “people from a certain religion are the vote bank of other parties that support certain ideologies”. When the court asked how one ascertains the ideology of the other political parties, Mr. Narang submitted that their manifestos are a source.

The case stems from an FIR lodged against Mr. Mishra on the orders of Election Commission (EC), which had earlier issued a show-cause notice to him for his statement that a “mini Pakistan is being made in Delhi”. The EC also took cognisance of the BJP leader’s tweets in which he said “February 8th will be India vs Pakistan in Delhi”. February 8 was the date of the Delhi election.

The FIR was lodged after the EC found Mr. Mishra’s replies “unsatisfactory”. He was booked under Section 125 of Representation of the People Act, 1951 dealing with promoting enmity between classes of citizens in connection with an election.

Delhi Police had filed a chargesheet in the case on November 1, 2023 and a supplementary chargesheet was also filed on March 4, 2024. The trial court allowed the application for condonation of delay in filing the chargesheet and took cognisance by summoning Mr. Mishra, who later approached the ACJM’s court seeking quashing of the summons.

A trial court here, earlier this month, dismissed the revision petition filed by Mr. Mishra against the summoning order of the trial court and observed that at this stage, the statements made by him appear to be “a brazen attempt to promote enmity on the grounds of religion by way of indirectly referring to a ‘country’, which unfortunately in common parlance is often used to denote the members of a particular religion”.

Delhi Police, meanwhile, said it has sought a report from X (formerly Twitter) in the matter. The ACJM’s court fixed May 26 as the next date of hearing.