The Supreme Court came to the rescue of a Bengaluru couple by quashing a criminal case slapped on them for complaining about an errant cop on Facebook. Interestingly, the post was made on the official Facebook page of the Bengaluru Traffic Police meant to receive complaints and suggestions from general public.
Noting this fact, the apex Bench of Justices V Gopala Gowda and R Banumathi said, “As far as comments posted on Facebook are concerned, it appears that it is a public forum meant for helping the public and the act of appellants posting a comment on the Facebook may not attract ingredients of criminal intimidation in Section 503 IPC.”
The couple — Manik Taneja and Sakshi Jawa — had met an accident in Bengaluru on June 13, 2013. Their car hit an auto injuring one of the passengers. The couple drove the victims to the hospital and bore full expenses of their treatment. The matter was amicably settled. But the constable insisted the couple to meet the Inspector in charge of Pulakeshi Nagar police station. Inspector Kasim Raja dealt rudely with the couple and even threatened them with dire consequences.
The harrowing experience was posted by Manik on the Bangalore Police’s Facebook page. He even shot an email to air his grievance to the top authorities. But before any action could be taken on their complaint, the accused cop filed a complaint against the duo charging them of threatening a public servant under IPC Section 353 and criminal intimidation (Section 503).
The couple sought quashing of the complaint but the Karnataka High Court refused to interfere citing the petition as premature. But the apex court felt that if the ingredients of the charge are not made out, the complaint can be quashed at a preliminary stage.
In the ultimate analysis, it held, “In our considered view, the appellants might have posted the comment online under the bona fide belief that it was within the permissible limits.”