New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Friday granted relief to TV news anchor Rohit Ranjan and directed the concerned authorities not to take any coercive steps against him in connection with multiple FIRs lodged against him for running an alleged doctored video of Congress leader Rahul Gandhi.
A vacation bench of Justices Indira Banerjee and JK Maheshwari also issued notice to the Central government through the office of the Attorney General on Rohit Ranjan’s plea.
Senior Advocate Siddharth Luthra, appearing for Rohit Ranjan, told the apex court that multiple FIRs were lodged against him for the same allegation.
In the plea filed through law firm Karanjawala and Co, the petitioner, Ranjan has sought various reliefs including quashing of FIRs filed against him or clubbing of multiple FIRs lodged against him in connection with a “misleading show”.
Luthra mentioned Ranjan’s plea before the Supreme Court on Wednesday and apprised the court that he was arrested on Tuesday by Noida Police and later released on bail and now the Chhattisgarh Police wants to arrest him.
Luthra has said that the matter needs an urgent hearing as Ranjan will be in repeated custody due to multiple FIRs lodged against him.
He has informed the court that he does a show in which there was a mistake and he later apologized for it but multiple FIRs were filed against him.
Chhattisgarh Police on Tuesday reached the television channel news anchor’s residence in Ghaziabad, Uttar Pradesh after an FIR was registered against him following the broadcast of a misleading video on Congress leader Rahul Gandhi for which the channel had issued an apology.
The anchor Rohit Ranjan, however, was taken into custody by Noida Police after he took to Twitter earlier and posted: “Chhattisgarh Police is standing outside my house to arrest me without informing the local police, is it legal”.
He tagged Uttar Pradesh chief minister Yogi Adityanath and SSP Ghaziabad and ADG Zone Lucknow in the tweet.
Responding to Ranjan’s tweet, the Raipur Police, Chhatisgarh, posted on its Twitter handle, “There is no such rule to inform. Still, now they are informed. The police team has shown you the court’s warrant of arrest. You should in fact cooperate, join in the investigation and put your defence in court.”
Meanwhile, ADCP Noida said, “In the course of an investigation registered at police station Sector 20, a person named Rohit Ranjan, working in a news channel is being questioned.”
Ranjan on his show said, “In our show DNA, Rahul Gandhi’s statement was taken in the wrong context by linking it to the Udaipur incident, it was a human error for which our team apologises.”
The Congress filed a complaint in Raipur against Ranjan for allegedly “running a doctored video of Rahul Gandhi”.
According to reports, the FIR filed by Congress said that Rohit Ranjan intentionally linked Rahul Gandhi’s statements on the vandalization of his office to the Udaipur incident in an attempt to incite public sentiments.
Congress MP Rahul Gandhi while referring to the attack on his Wayanad office had said, “The children who did this have acted in an irresponsible way. They are kids, forgive them.”
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