Police book Tapas Pal

KRISHNANAGAR (NADIA): Prodded by Calcutta high court, Nadia police on Saturday lodged an FIR against actor-turned-Trinamool Congress MP Tapas Pal in the infamous hate speech case.
While addressing public meetings at Nakashipara in Nadia a few months ago, Pal allegedly threatened to shoot Opposition workers with his gun. He also threatened to let loose his party workers to rape women of the Opposition parties.A nation-wide protest erupted against his hate speech after video footages of the public meetings were made public.
Pal tendered an unconditional apology following a public outcry for having made such statements. The Trinamool Congress officially distanced itself from the comments. But, it didn’t punish the MP for his rash remarks. Police also took no steps till the high court stepped in. On Thursday, Justice Nishita Mhatre directed police to lodge an FIR against Pal within 72 hours. The court also directed CID to probe the hate speech episode.
In the FIR that was lodged in Nakashipara police station, Pal was charged under sections 504 (intentional insult with intent to provoke breach of peace), 505 (statements conducing to public mischief), 506 (criminal intimidation) and 509 (word, gesture or act intended to insult the modesty of a woman) of the Indian Penal Code. Of these, Section 505 is non-bailable.
Nadia police superintendent Arnab Ghosh confirmed that the FIR had been lodged.
Pal’s alleged hate speech led to an interesting legal battle that saw a split verdict from a division bench of the high court and the appointment of a single judge to act as “referee”. Initially, police had refused to entertain the complaint of Biplab Chowdhury, who was the petitioner in the case. When Chowdhury moved court of Justice Dipankar Datta, the judge directed police to treat Chowdhury’s complaint as an FIR and transfer the case to the DIG-CID within 72 hours.
The state preferred an appeal and the matter was heard by the division bench of Justice Girish Gupta and Justice T Chakraborti. After completion of hearing, the court gave a split verdict. While Justice Gupta was of the view that Justice Datta’s directions should be set aside, Justice Chakraborti differed. It was then left to the chief justice of the high court to appoint a referee judge. The matter finally went to Justice Nishita Mhatre. On Thursday, Justice Mhatre ordered filing of the FIR, but observed that no monitoring by the high court was required in the case.
While passing her judgment, Justice Mhatre also held that police were dragging their feet and had failed in their duty by not registering an FIR against Pal.