The Supreme Court on Monday extended the interim protection from arrest till March 3 for Congress leader Pawan Khera in connection with criminal cases lodged against him over controversial comments he made on Prime Minister Narendra Modi during a press briefing 10 days ago.
A bench led by Chief Justice of India Dhananjaya Y Chandrachud extended the reprieve for another four days since Khera’s plea for clubbing and transferring the three first information reports (FIRs) against him at one place could not be taken up for a detailed hearing.
Further, the states of Assam and Uttar Pradesh, where the three FIRs have been lodged, sought time to respond to the plea by Khera, the chairperson of the Congress’s media and publicity wing.
“List the Petition on March 3, 2023. The ad–interim order passed on February 23, 2023, shall continue to remain in operation till the next date of listing,” ordered the bench, which also included justices PS Narasimha and JB Pardiwala.
Last week, while raising allegations of fraud against the Adani Group and business tycoon Gautam Adani, Khera had said that when a joint parliamentary committee could be set up by former prime ministers PV Narasimha Rao and Atal Bihari Vajpayee, what was the problem of “Narendra Gautamdas, sorry…Narendra Damodardas Modi”. The remarks sparked a storm of criticism from the BJP even as the leader said it was a slip of the tongue. He even went on to say that the “work is like Gautam Das but name is Damodardas”.
Later, FIRs were registered against him at Halflong in Assam, and at Lucknow and Varanasi in Uttar Pradesh, under several sections of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) including 120B (criminal conspiracy), 153A (spreading religious enmity), 500 (defamation), 504 (intentional insult with intent to provoke breach of peace) 505 (1a) (making statement with intent to cause fear or alarm in public). The cases were lodged at the instance of BJP leaders.
Khera on Thursday was pulled off a plane at the Delhi airport, detained on the tarmac and later arrested, before the Supreme Court granted him interim protection and a lower court subsequently set him free on bail in the evening in the case lodged by the Assam police.
While protecting the Congress leader from arrest, the top court had also recorded that “the petitioner (Khera) tenders an unconditional apology” and “that the use of the language was inadvertent, though inappropriate, and that he would not stand by the use of such language.”
On that day, the court had clarified that Khera will have to seek regular bail from the jurisdictional court after all the cases are clubbed and transferred to one place.