Hours after the Supreme Court of India granted interim bail to Alt News co-founder Mohammed Zubair in the Sitapur case against him, Lakhimpur Kheri district police secured a production warrant for Mr. Zubair from a local court, which directed that he be produced before it on Monday (July 11).
While the Supreme Court had clarified that it was granting bail only in the Sitapur case, jail officials in the district were supposed to release Mr. Zubair into the custody of Delhi Police so that he can be taken back to Tihar jail for judicial custody in the Delhi FIR.
On Saturday evening, Sitapur jail superintendent Suresh Kumar Singh told The Hindu that Mr. Zubair was still in his jail, “We received the release warrant for Mr. Zubair in the Sitapur case. He is also in judicial custody in the Delhi case. And now, we have also received the production warrant in the Lakhimpur case. We have to release him but we are now yet to decide whether he will be taken to Delhi or to Lakhimpur.”
Advocate Mukul Mishra, who represented Mr. Zubair in the Sitapur court, said, “I delivered the release warrant to the Sitapur jail on Friday evening. There is no reason why he should remain in Sitapur jail if granted bail in that case.”
The office of the Superintendent of Police, Lakhimpur, said, “We are going to seek police custody of Mr. Zubair in the FIR registered at the Mohammadi police station. The court has issued a production warrant and Mr. Zubair needs to be produced before it on July 11.”
Meanwhile, Delhi Police officials have said they are not taking custody of Mr. Zubair for the time being. The scribe’s lawyers say that he will most likely remain in Sitapur jail till he is produced in Lakhimpur.
The Lakhimpur case was registered last year in September, 2021, under Section 153A of the IPC (promoting enmity between different groups), on a complaint by one Ashish Kumar Katiyar, a journalist working at Sudarshan TV, whose chief Suresh Chavhanke, has been accused of hate speech against Muslims.
In the complaint, Mr. Katiyar referred to a tweet posted by Mr. Zubair in May 2021. In the tweet, Mr. Zubair factchecks a report carried on the said news channel, which superimposed an image of a famous Medina mosque on an image of the Gaza strip, to incorrectly show that the said mosque was being destroyed in Israeli air-strikes.
The complainant has claimed that Mr. Zubair was inciting Muslims against the news channel by posting the fact-check, and has also named Twitter as an accused in the case. Mr. Katiyar had initially approached a court with his complaint, which had then directed the police to register an FIR in the matter.
