Supreme Court grants protection to another journalist booked for tweet on caste bias in UP administration

The Supreme Court on Thursday granted interim relief to journalist Mamta Tripathi booked in a series of criminal cases for putting a post on X (formerly Twitter) on caste dynamics in appointments to the Uttar Pradesh administration [Mamta Tripathi v. State of Uttar Pradesh and Another].

A three-judge bench of Justice BR Gavai, Justice Prashant Kumar Mishra and Justice KV Viswanathan said that no coercive action should be taken against Tripathi and also sought the Uttar Pradesh government's response to the plea filed by Tripathi to quash four First Information Reports (FIRs) registered against her.

"Issue notice to respondent. In the meanwhile no coercive action will be taken against the petitioner in the cases against her," the Court said in its order.

During the hearing today, Senior Advocate Siddharth Dave, appearing for Tripathi, informed the court that another journalist-Abhishek Upadhyay has been granted protection in the same case.

"This is same case where Justice Roy's bench had granted protection to another journalist. He (referring to Upadhyay) had only one FIR registered, against me there are four FIR registered for the same case," Dave submitted.

Taking note of the same, the Court proceeded to grant interim protection Tripathi.

On October 4, the top court had granted protection to to Lucknow-based journalist, Abhishek Upadhyay in the same case.

In its order, the Court had commented on a journalist's right to free speech under Article 19(1)(a) of the Constitution. It said that a criminal case cannot be slapped against a journalist merely because his writings are viewed as critical of the government.

"In democratic nations, freedom to express one’s views are respected. The rights of the journalists are protected under Article 19(1)(a) of the Constitution of India. Merely because writings of a journalist are perceived as criticism of the Government, criminal cases should not be slapped against the writer," the Court had observed.

The post by Abhishek Upadhyay on X (formerly Twitter), titled "Yadav Raj versus Thakur Raj (or Singh Raj)" dealt with caste dynamics in the administrative machinery of Uttar Pradesh (UP).

Tripathi had also made a similar post like Upadhyay on X (formerly Twitter)

A translated version of Upadhyay's post began with the following comment:

"Since during the tenure of Akhilesh Yadav, the media has extensively researched and run news on 'Yadav Raj', it is now necessary to discuss 'Thakur Raj' during the tenure of Yogi Adityanath."

The ensuing portion of the post included a list of persons, allegedly from the Thakur community, who are presently part of the UP administration.

The post questioned whether there was caste bias and whether the State was giving preference to members of the Thakur community in making government appointments.

An FIR was later registered against both Upadhyay and Tripathi under Sections 353(2) [hate speech], 197(1)(C) [statement against national integration], 302 (hurting religious feelings), 356 (defamation) of the Bharatiya Nyay Sanhita (BNS) and Section 66 of the Information Technology (Amendment) Act, 2008.

The FIR was registered on a complaint by one Pankaj Kumar. The plea filed by Tripathi sought quashing of this case as well as three other cases.