New Delhi: The SC on Friday hearing the bail plea posted by Alt News Co-Founder Zubair granted him interim bail for a few days.
Senior Advocate Colin Gonsalves representing the fact-checker argued that no criminal case can be made out against Zubair. “The foundation of this case is a tweet. We seek quashing of proceedings, and questions of police or judicial custody are irrelevant now. There’s no case made out and the proceedings need to be quashed,” he told the apex court, today.
Solicitor Gen Tushar appearing for the UP Police alleged that the journalists’ petition did not mention that his plea was rejected by the Sitapur court yesterday. According to Mehta, the matter was not about the tweet in question, but rather to ascertain whether Zubair was “part of a syndicate to put out such tweets to destabilise the society”. Calling Zubair a “habitual offender”, Mehta also alleged that there was a “money angle” involved.
“Whether donations from countries inimical to India have been received by them is under investigation,” Mehta said, adding that the Delhi High Court had refused interim relief to Zubair and granted remand.
The bail is an interim order and the case will be heard after five days, sources said. They also added that the bail was conditioned and Zubair couldn’t go out of Delhi nor post any tweets.
Zubair on Thursday had moved the SC citing death threats. He had sought bail and urged the FIRs registered against him to be quashed. The Allahabad HC on June 10th had refused to quash the FIR.