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Bareilly court orders action against police officials and complainant in fake conversion case

Additional Sessions Judge Gyanendra Tripathi remarked that the matter is worrying for civilised society and said the real culprits in the case are responsible police officials and complainant

Introduction

In a matter pertaining to a false case registered under UP anti-conversion law, the District and Sessions Court in Bareilly has come out strongly against the erring police officials and complainant, terming it a case of malicious prosecution. The Additional Sessions Judge Gyanendra Tripathi also ordered Superintendent of Police (SP) Bareilly to take action against the complainant, witnesses Arvind Kumar, Devendra Singh and Ravindra Kumar, the then police station in-charge of Bithari Chainpur, Shitanshu Sharma, and the investigators and the circle officer who approved the chargesheet, Indian Express reported.

The FIR was first registered in the case on May 29, 2022, based on the complaint from Bareilly district president of Hindu Jagran Manch, Himanshu Patel. The complaint named Abhishek Gupta as an accused and later another person named Kundan Lal was also booked, allegedly, based on the statement made by Gupta. The FIR alleged that Gupta along with his 8-member team were involved in running a racket of religious conversion to convert people to Christianity, and the accused were charged under Section 3/5 of the Uttar Pradesh Prohibition of Unlawful Conversion of Religion Act, 2021. The court ruled that the complainant, the witnesses, the police personnel, including the police station head, the investigator and the jurisdictional officer who approved the charge sheet “are the real culprits”, LiveLaw reported.

Importantly, the verdict pointed out that the complainant was not eligible to file this complaint under the UP anti-conversion law, nonetheless, the police officials allowed him to register the complaint and even approved chargesheet in the case, revealing malicious intent of the police personnel and the complainant.

Justice Tripathi also said that the fabricated case adversely affected the two accused, with Abhishek Gupta losing his job at Rohilkhand Medical College, apart from suffering social disrepute. The court remarked that “It is clear that the police acted under some pressure on the complaints made by persons like the complainant for publicity purposes. In an unsuccessful attempt to give a legal shape to the baseless and fabricated and imaginary story, the action was taken. Due to this, valuable time, labour and money of not only the police but also the court was wasted.”

Furthermore, the court questioned the narrative of the prosecution and observed that “there is no evidence of the alleged action taken by the police at the alleged incident site. No person was arrested from the spot who was instigating religious conversion or making efforts in that regard. Apart from this, during the investigation, no person was examined by the investigator who was motivated to convert to religion or any effort was made in that regard. As per the prosecution version, no holy scriptures like Bible, book etc. were recovered from the spot”.

The court acquitted the accused charged in the case and said that they may file a civil suit against the complainant, erring police personnel, and witnesses for engaging in a malicious prosecution.

The present judgement is significant in the backdrop of recent amendment to the law which allows “anyone” to file the complaint under the UP anti-conversion law, which has already been criticised by rights groups for its blatant misuse to target religious minorities.

While the Allahabad HC has ruled inconsistently over the matters related to religious conversion, interfaith marriage, and bail applications for those charged under UP anti-conversion law, this ruling from district court is a progressive step forward to prevent misuse of the law and official powers vested with the police machinery.

The copy of the judgement can be found here:


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