The trial court has not taken cognisance of the chargesheet in the absence of prosecution sanction.A Delhi court Tuesday granted police time till September 18 to procure sanction to prosecute former JNU students’ union president Kanhaiya Kumar and others in a 2016 sedition case after the investigating officer informed the court that he does not have any information from Delhi government’s home department regarding the same.
Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Manish Khurana told Delhi Police to make its stand clear and passed an order calling for a report by the DCP regarding the status of prosecution sanction on September 18.
Till date, the trial court has not taken cognisance of the chargesheet in the absence of prosecution sanction. Police has claimed in its chargesheet that Kumar was leading a procession and supported seditious slogans raised on campus during an event on February 9, 2016, held to mark the hanging of Parliament attack convict Afzal Guru. Police also charged former JNU students Umar Khalid and Anirban Bhattacharya, among others.
The accused have been charged with offences under IPC sections 124A (sedition), 323 (punishment for voluntarily causing hurt), 465 (punishment for forgery), 471 (using as genuine a forged document or electronic record), 143 (punishment for being a member of an unlawful assembly), 149 (being a member of an unlawful assembly), 147 (punishment for rioting) and 120B (criminal conspiracy).
IPC Section 124-A (sedition) requires prior sanction from a competent authority and in case sanction is not given, the court can raise objections after looking at the contents of the chargesheet.
As reported by The Indian Express, the Delhi government’s standing counsel, in response to a query by the Delhi government on whether or not to grant sanction to Delhi Police to prosecute Kumar and others, is learnt to have given the opinion that the police request be turned down.
Sources in the Delhi government’s home department said the law officer, Rahul Mehra — after perusing the original complaint, the findings of JNU’s High-Level Committee, and the transcript of the entire incident on February 9, 2016 — came to the conclusion that there was material error on the part of police in filing the chargesheet.
