The Uttarakhand High Court has refused to quash a case against a man claiming to be an animal lover and accused of attempting to start a mob gathering and lynching through a live Facebook telecast from his account. The High Court took note of his claims to start a revolution and held that he was deriding democratically elected governments, which is condemnable.

The Petitioner approached the High Court seeking issuance of a direction to quash the impugned first information report for the offences punishable under section 109 & 190 of Bhartiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023. The petitioner also sought the relief of no arrest.

The Division Bench of Chief Justice G. Narendar and Justice Subhash Upadhyay held, “Where the petitioner has been named of a conginzable offence, it would not be appropriate and legal for this Court to pronounce on the correctness of the allegations at the stage of FIR. The provisions of law, more particularly the provisions of Section 35 of the BNSS, 2023 clearly enumerate as to when a person can be arrested. In the event of any violation he can certainly approach the courts immediately.”

“That apart the complainant has produced a copy of a post made by the petitioner on his FaceBook account. He claims that he is going to start a “Kranti” (revolution), not only here but across the country/other places. In other words he is deriding popular & democratically elected governments and the same is condemnable. In that view, the petition does not merit consideration and is, accordingly, rejected”, the order read.

Advocate Lalit Sharma represented the Petitioner while Deputy Advocate General J.S. Virk represented the Respondent.

Factual Background

The case presented by the petitioner was that he is an animal lover, and he received information about the illegal transportation of cow meat. He immediately informed the police and the forest officers. The Petitioner claimed that he started a live Facebook telecast of the incident. It was his case that the video would demonstrate that he was requesting the mob and trying to placate the angry mob not to assault the victim, i.e. the driver of the vehicle in which the meat was being transported.

Arguments

The petitioner submitted that, being an informant himself, he was attempting to placate and save the victim. It was the petitioner’s case that the act of naming him in the FIR was mischievous and done with an ulterior motive.

On the contrary, the Deputy Advocate General submitted that the complainant, who is the wife of the injured victim, had named the petitioner amongst others. It was further contended that the police made attempts to investigate the petitioner, but he successfully evaded and avoided the police.

Reasoning

Referring to the report detailing the role of the petitioner, the Bench noted that the petitioner went live with his social media Facebook handle, which led to the gathering of the mob. As per the said report, the police suspected him to be responsible for instigating the mob and doing live telecast near the mob lynching.

It was further noticed that the videos circulated by others led to a situation where huge numbers from both communities arrived at the police station. According to the report, 16 accused were identified, 13 were arrested, and 3 were evading arrest, including the petitioner.

The Bench found that the Circle Officer noted that the petitioner was continuously hiding from police and evading arrest. The NBW issued by the Courts had also not been respected. The Bench stated, “The fact remains that the victim and his wife are localites and residents of the same town and have identified and named the petitioner as one of the perpetrators. The documents in the possession of the victim certify the meat as buffalo meat. The fact remains that the petitioner admits his presence in the place of occurrence. The fact also remains that the petitioner admits the live face-book telecast. His defense is that he acted as good-Samaritan and did not indulge in assaulting the victim."

Reference was also made to the photographs showing bleeding injuries on the head and other parts of the body of the victim. Thus, in light of such facts and circumstances, the Bench dismissed the Petition.

Cause Title: Madan Mohan Joshi v. State of Uttarakhand (Neutral Citation: 2025:UHC:10380-DB)

Appearance

Petitioner: Advocates Lalit Sharma, Anmol Sandhu

Respondent: Deputy Advocate General J.S. Virk, Brief Holder R.K. Joshi, Advocates Ayush Gaur, Mrinal Kanwar

Click here to read/download Order


Uttarakhand High CourtChief Justice G Narendar

Tulip Kanth

Assistant Editor

Tulip Kanth is an Assistant Editor at Verdictum having over 5 years of experience in the field of legal journalism and editing. She extensively covers judgments of the Supreme Court, High Courts as well as Tribunals. She has previously worked with a legal publishing website where she oversaw the work of other editors and has also created updates on notifications of different Government Ministries. She holds an English Honours Degree from SGTB Khalsa College, Delhi University and has completed her LLB course with specialisation in Corporate Law from Amity University.