The Allahabad High Court has granted bail to eight out of 14 persons accused of consuming non-vegetarian food on a boat in the river Ganga in Varanasi and dumping the leftover waste into the water during an Iftar gathering in March this year.
In two separate orders, the single-judge Benches of Justice Jitendra Kumar Sinha and Justice Rajiv Lochan Shukla granted bail to Mohammad Azad Ali, Mohammad Tahseem, Nihal Afridi, Mohammad Tauseef, Mohammad Anas, Mohammad Sameer, Mohammad Ahmed Raza and Mohammad Faizan on Friday.
While Justice Shukla granted bail to five of the accused, Justice Sinha granted bail to three, taking the total to eight. The judges directed the release of the accused on furnishing the requisite bail bonds and subject to conditions imposed by the trial court.
The accused had approached the High Court after the Sessions Court in Varanasi denied them bail on April 1. Earlier in February this year, a Chief Judicial Magistrate (CJM) court had also rejected their bail petitions.
A case was registered against 14 Muslim men after videos showing them breaking their Ramadan fast on a boat in the river went viral on social media. An FIR was lodged based on a complaint filed by Rajat Jaiswal, president of the Varanasi city unit of the Bharatiya Janata Yuva Morcha (BJYM).
The complainant alleged that the accused organised an Iftar gathering on a boat in the Ganga river, consumed chicken biryani and other non-vegetarian food items, and threw leftover waste material into the river. Jaiswal alleged that the incident hurt religious sentiments and caused public outrage among followers of the Hindu faith. Varanasi Police arrested the accused on March 17.
Initially, the accused were booked under Sections 298 (defiling a place of worship), 299 (deliberate acts intended to outrage religious feelings), 196(1)(B) (promoting enmity), 270 (public nuisance), 279 (fouling water of a public spring or reservoir), and 223(B) (disobedience to an order promulgated by a public servant) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS), along with Section 24 of the Water (Prevention and Control of Pollution) Act, 1974, which prohibits disposal of polluting matter into streams and water bodies.
Subsequently, police invoked more serious provisions, including Section 308(5) of the BNS relating to extortion by threat of death or grievous hurt, after the boat owners alleged that the accused had forcibly taken the vessel. The accused were also charged under Section 67 of the Information Technology Act, which penalises the publication or transmission of obscene or sexually explicit material in electronic form.
Jaiswal alleged that the acts attributed to the accused were carried out deliberately and had the potential to disturb communal harmony and public order.
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