Turban an essential religious symbol: Punjab and Haryana High Court

A turban is an essential religious symbol, the Punjab and Haryana High Court recently observed while rejecting anticipatory bail plea of persons accused of assaulting a 65-year-old man, removing his turban and uploading video of the same on Facebook (Gurpreet Singh and Others v. State of Punjab)..Single-Judge Justice Anupinder Singh Grewal said that the act of the accused would amount to hurting religious sentiments under Section 295A of the Indian Penal Code (IPC). "It is manifest that that the complainant is 65 years old elderly person. His turban had been taken off and he had been repeatedly beaten up. The petitioner and other accused had video-graphed him without the turban when he was bleeding and the same had been uploaded on the facebook. The turban is an essential religious symbol and photographing of an elderly person in an injured condition without the turban and uploading it for public viewing on a social platform would prima facie amount to hurting the religious feelings," the Court said.The accused Gurpreet Singh and others had been booked under Sections 323 (voluntarily causing hurt), 341 (wrongful restraint), 506 (Criminal intimidation), 148 (rioting, armed with deadly weapon), 295-A (hurting religious sentiments] and 149 (Unlawful Assembly) of the Indian Penal Code 1860 and Section 66-E of the Information Technology Act, 2000..Advocate Amit Arora appearing for the applicants, had argued that all offences except the one under Section 295A are bailable. With regard to Section 295A, it was contended that prima facie no case was made out under the same. Further, it was pointed out that the First Information Report (FIR) was registered after a delay of 1 year and 5 months.Advocate Vikas Gupta appearing for the complainant (victim), submitted that prior to the complainant moving a petition under Section 482 of the Criminal Procedure Code 1973 before the High Court, several representations and complaints were made to the police but no action was initiated..The Court noted that turban is an essential religious symbol and capturing on video an injured, bleeding person after removing his turban would amount to hurting religious sentiments."Therefore, I do not agree with the contention of the learned counsel for the petitioner that a prima facie case under Section 295-A IPC is not made out," the Court said rejecting the plea for anticipatory bail..[Read Order]