MOHAN C. LAZARUS Vs. STATE

JUDGEMENT

(1.) These batch of petitions demonstrate how certain mindless and reckless statements made by a person under the grips of religious fervour puts him in a piquant situation, resulting in a barrage of criminal complaints given against him by all those persons whose religious sentiments were affected by those statements.

(2.) The Petitioner in all these petitions is the founder of 'Jesus Redeems Ministry' which is a Trust run by him for the last forty years. The Petitioner is an evangelist. On one of the occasions, the Petitioner while addressing a group of his followers, had made certain statements about Hindu temples and Hindu Gods to those group of persons. At a later point of time, the video containing the speech given by the Petitioner was circulated on social media and it had spread across the length and breadth of Tamil Nadu. Various complaints were given at different police stations across Tamil Nadu against the Petitioner, by persons belonging to the Hindu religion on the ground that the statements made by the Petitioner in the meeting about Hindu Temples and Hindu Gods affected theirreligious sentiments and feelings. Therefore, several FIRs came to be registered for offences under sections 153A(1)(a), 153A(1)(b), 295A, 505(1)(b) and 505(1)(c) of the Indian Penal Code, 1806. Some of the cases also resulted in filing of final report for the said offences. These petitions have been filed under Section 482 of theCode of Criminal Procedure, 1973, seeking to quash the FIRs/criminal proceedings against the Petitioner. The particulars of the cases registered against the Petitioner is extracted hereinunder by way of a tabular column:

(3.) When all these matters came up for final hearing, this Court asked Mr. Issac Mohanlal, learned senior counsel appearing on behalf of the Petitioner, as to when and where the Petitioner had made the alleged statements. The learned senior counsel in all fairness submitted that the Petitioner addressed a gathering in an indoor auditorium at Avadi, Chennai on 18.03.2016 and during that occasion, the Petitioner had made certain statements and that those statements were not intended to wound the religious feelings and sentiments of the Hindus. The learned senior counsel further submitted that the video was released in a truncated manner with ulterior motives in the year 2018. The learned senior counsel submitted that he is not trying to justify or support the statements made by the Petitioner and that he does not endorse the views expressed by the Petitioner on that occasion. He further submitted that it was a gathering of like-minded persons, within closed doors, where the Petitioner was answering some question that was raised by one of the participants. This was not a public meeting addressed by the Petitioner and the statements made by the Petitioner was not intended to be made to persons belonging to the Hindu religion.