Bombay HC says messages sent to IAS officer opposing tree cutting at Aarey for Metro car shed not offensive

Bombay High Court has said that the Messages sent to an IAS officer opposing the cutting of trees in Mumbai's Aarey Colony for the construction of a Metro Rail car shed were not offensive, but were assertion of a democratic right of a citizen of this country to put forth his view to object and protest.

A division bench of Justices Sunil Shukre and Milind Sathaye noted that registering a first information report (FIR) for such an offence would amount to an invasion on the rights of citizens of this country.

The bench on April 5 quashed a January 2018 FIR registered at the suburban Bandra Kurla Complex (BKC) police station against Avijit Michael, a Bengaluru resident, for allegedly sending offensive messages to IAS officer Ashwini Bhide, who at the time was heading the Mumbai Metro Rail Corporation Ltd (MMRCL), and for allegedly obstructing her from discharging her public duties.

These messages do not contain any offensive material or any obscenities. Rather, they appear to have been sent in assertion of a democratic right of a citizen of this country to put forth his view point, to object, to protest, to persuade, to urge, and so on, the court said.

The police upon receiving such a complaint, howsoever high he or she may be in position, must never book any ordinary citizen of the country under criminal law, it added, and if it does, it would be like suppressing his voice against what he considers to be a wrongful thing, the court said.

It is necessary that there must be a public servant who is voluntarily obstructed by another in discharge of his public functions and such obstruction must have direct connection with the discharge of public functions of such public servant, the court said.

It added that the alleged messages sent to Bhide do not show that the sender had intended to obstruct her from discharging her public duties. These messages show at their face-value that the sender of the messages was the person who had intention to make efforts for preservation of the trees in the larger interest of society, the order said.