NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Wednesday granted anticipatory bail to Indian Youth Congress president Srinivas BV in a sexual harassment case lodged against him in Assam by a Congress functionary who was expelled by the party for anti-party activities.
A bench of justices BR Gavai and Sanjay Karol noticed that though the alleged incident took place at Raipur during the Congress plenary session held between February 24 and 26, the complaint was registered in Assam after nearly two months on April 19.
The court directed Srinivas to appear before the investigating officer on May 22 and said that the officer will release him on anticipatory bail on furnishing a personal bond of ₹50,000 and one or more sureties.
“Taking into account the delay of over one month to file FIR, the petitioner will be entitled to interim protection,” the court said, issuing notice to the Assam government.
The court asked lawyer Shailesh Madiyal appearing for the complainant what she was doing for two months before filing a FIR.
“I was pursuing my complaint within my party ranks,” Madiyal said. But the court pointed out: “She is a lawyer. Does she not know her legal rights?”
Srinivas BV was represented by senior advocates Abhishek Manu Singhvi and Devadatt Kamat who produced copies of tweets and media interviews given by the complainant to media channels till one day before registration of complaint. In the interviews, Srinivas said, there was no whisper of the alleged case of outraging the modesty by the petitioner, which is a punishable offence under Section 354 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC).
In her complaint to the police, she alleged that Srinivas heckled her and held her hand.
The Assam police was represented by additional solicitor general (ASG) SV Raju who opposed the arrest shield, claiming that Srinivas refused to appear despite being served summons.
“That may be because of the loss of reputation. You (Assam police) had arrested someone at the airport,” the court said, referring to the arrest of Congress spokesperson Pawan Khera who was arrested from Delhi airport for making a comment during a press conference targeting Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
Khera was released on the orders passed by the Supreme Court.
Raju said that Srinivas had even refused to cooperate with the probe being conducted by the crimimal investigation department (CID) on an instruction from the National Commission for Women (NCW).
The bench directed Srinivas to cooperate with the NCW enquiry and further asked him to appear before the investigation officer as and when required.
Posting the matter for hearing on July 10, the court clarified that the observations made in the order are meant to decide the issue of interim relief and shall not weigh during the trial of the case.
Srinivas approached the top court after his anticipatory bail was rejected by the Gauhati high court. The Assam police registered the FIR under various provisions of the IPC of which Section 354 alone was non-bailable.