Court returns charge sheet against Amit Shah to police

Asks police to remove 'technical errors' before reproducing it

A Muzaffarnagar court on Thursday returned the charge sheet filed by the police against BJP chief Amit Shah in the hate speech case on technical grounds.

Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate Sunder Lal, while refusing to take cognisance of the charge sheet filed on Wednesday, asked the police to remove the technical errors before filing the same in the court.

According to police sources here, the court observed that the police had not followed the provisions of the CrPC before filing the charge sheet. 

Sources said that the police were studying the court's observations and a fresh charge sheet, after removing the errors, was likely to be filed in the next few days.

 The police have slapped Sections 153 A (Promoting enmity between different groups on grounds of religion, race, place of birth, residence, language, etc., and doing acts prejudicial to maintenance of harmony), 295 A (Deliberate and malicious acts, intended to outrage reli­gious feelings of any class by insulting its religion or reli­gious beliefs) along with sections 505, 125 and some other sections of the IPC.

The case against Shah pertained to an alleged speech delivered by him on April 4 while addressing BJP workers at Muzaffarnagar. Shah had reportedly said that the time had come to avenge the Muzaffarnagar communal riots.

Shah was then served a notice by the Election Commission (EC), but the latter had rejected a demand from the opposition parties to impose a ban on election meetings of Shah. 

“One can live without food or water but not after humiliation,” Shah had reportedly said at the meeting. 

Shah was then the in-charge of BJP’s poll campaigning in Uttar Pradesh. He had reportedly uttered similar words at meetings of party workers at Shamli and Bijnore as well.