The words and the picture journalist Mohammed Zubair used in a 2018 tweet “against a particular religious community and are highly provocative and more than sufficient to incite a feeling of hatred among people”, according to the Delhi Police’s First Information Report (FIR) against him.
The FIR, a copy of which news agency has seen, was registered on the basis of a sub-inspector’s complaint and says it has not been uploaded online because of its sensitive nature. It says the complainant was monitoring social media when he came across Twitter user @balajikijaiin’s post seeking action against Zubair’s tweet, which said: “BEFORE 2014: Honeymoon Hotel. After 2014: Hanuman Hotel.” The tweet was posted with an image of the hotel’s signboard.
“These words and the picture found to be used by Mohammed Zubair @zoo_bear against a particular religious community and are highly provocative and more than sufficient to incite [a] feeling of hatred among people which can be detrimental for maintenance of public tranquillity in society. Transmission and publication of such posts have been deliberately done by Mohammed Zubair through electronic media to insult the religious feelings of a particular community with [the] intent to promote breach of [the] peace which attracts offence under section 153A/295…” the FIR says.
The Indian Penal Code’s Sections 153A and 295 relate to the promotion of enmity between different groups and injuring or defiling a place of worship.
The Delhi Police on Monday arrested Zubair, the co-founder of fact-checking website Alt News, weeks after he flagged former Bharatiya Janata Party spokesperson Nupur Sharma’s comments against Prophet Mohammed.