A petition was filed in the Supreme Court on Thursday against the sedition case involving a school in Karnataka’s Bidar town, where students staged a play critical of the Citizenship Amendment Act and Prime Minister Narendra Modi, PTI reported.
The plea, filed by activist Yogita Bhayana, sought the quashing of the case against the school staff and directions for a proper mechanism to deal with the misuse of the sedition law. The plea claimed that the police had questioned students without the presence of any child welfare officials.
The petition said that the proceedings violated Article 21 of the Constitution and abused the process of law. Article 21 grants citizens the right to life and personal liberty.
“Issue an order directing the Centre to constitute a committee to scrutinise complaints under Section 124A IPC [Indian Penal Code] and adhere to judgements by the apex court before registering the FIR [first information report] under the Section 124A IPC,” the petition said. Section 124A of the Indian Penal Code deals with sedition.
The police claim the play, which was staged by children at a school in Bidar on January 21, was seditious and inflammatory. The police have drawn flak for filing sedition charges on the basis of a complaint by an activist of the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad, which is the students’ wing of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh. The police have alleged that students of Class 4, 5 and 6 insulted Modi.
The head teacher of the Shaheen Urdu Medium Primary School and the mother of one of the students were arrested on January 30. They were granted bail two weeks later.
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