HC grants bail to Malvinder Mali

The Punjab and Haryana high court has granted bail to Malvinder Singh Mali, the political adviser to erstwhile Punjab Congress president Navjot Singh Sidhu, in a case related to hurting religious sentiments.

The high court bench of justice Vinod S Bhardwaj, while seeking response from the Punjab Police, ordered that he be released on interim bail, till the next date of hearing, i.e January 24, 2025.

Mali was booked following the complaint of Amit Jain, a member of Punjab Gau-Sewa Commission, who had accused Mali of hurting religious sentiments. He was booked under Sections 196 (promoting enmity between different groups on grounds of religion, race, place of birth, residence) and 299 (deliberate and malicious acts, intended to outrage religious feelings of any class by insulting its religion or religious beliefs) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita in September.

In the high court, he had argued that the arrest was made in “blatant disregard” to the notified guidelines about the same by Supreme Court, rendering the detention order “illegal and liable to be set aside”. The guidelines which stress that a person should not be ordinarily arrested, list out do’s and don’ts for the cops. Offences punishable with a maximum sentence of three years, the said directions were required to be followed, it was argued. It was also alleged that the police had not even seen the alleged interview before FIR and was not even in possession of the electronic evidence but still the FIR was registered.