Zero FIR: Zero logic
Let us begin with the obvious. The words spoken about PM at Jantar Mantar on July 23 were crude. It is no secret that they rebutted no policy and answered no argument. A protest that had already forced a Union minister to resign on the strength of its grievance was diminished by them, not helped. They deserve condemnation.
On July 29, Noida police registered a zero FIR against the girl who spoke them. A zero FIR is one recorded at a station that has no local jurisdiction and then transferred onward, in this case, to Delhi.
The sections invoked were 352, 353(1) and 356(1) of Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, dealing with insult, public mischief and defamation respectively. The complaint came not from the person spoken about, but from a lawyer who had watched a video. The reasoning was that those words lowered the dignity of a constitutional office.
Disclaimer
Views expressed above are the author’s own.
