Former West Bengal Congress President and four-time party Lok Sabha member, Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury, has said that Sharmistha Panoli, the 22-year-old law student and social media influencer, who was arrested recently by Kolkata Police on charges of hurting religious sentiments and promoting disharmony and hatred, should be released immediately.
“The Indian Constitution gives every individual the right to express their views. It is a different issue if the statements or actions are against Constitutional norms or are illegal. But branding someone as a criminal for expressing his or her views, just because anyone does not like it, is not acceptable. So to my opinion she should be released,” Chowdhury said on Monday.
Earlier, BJP leaders in West Bengal, including the Leader of the Opposition (LoP) Suvendu Adhikari and State BJP President Sukanta Majumdar, questioned the “overnight” action of Kolkata Police against Sharmistha and called the move “votebank vendetta”.
LoP Adhikari said that Kolkata Police was hyperactive in arresting Sharmistha from Gurugram for making a comment in the wake of the Pahalgam terror attack, where Hindus were targeted selectively, which she later deleted and even apologised for.
On Monday, Sharmistha’s counsel said that his client has approached a court in Kolkata, demanding that her basic rights while being in the judicial custody are not denied.
On Monday, her counsel Md. Samimuddin told mediapersons that his client was suffering from kidney stones and hence she required proper hygiene, which was lacking at the correctional home where she is housed now.
“Apart from that, she is denied access to newspapers and certain other things, which are her basic right. So a petition has been filed at the court on Monday so that the correctional home authorities provide her with access to her basic rights. She is innocent and all efforts are on to get her released on bail,” Samimuddin said.
The Bar Council of Delhi (BCD) on Monday “strongly” condemned the arrest of Sharmistha by the West Bengal Police over a social media video.
On Sunday, senior advocate and Chairman of the Bar Council of India, Manan Kumar Mishra, demanded Sharmistha’s immediate release, calling upon the Bengal government and its police to abandon the dangerous path of targeting “select voices”.
Sharmishta was booked by the Kolkata Police after her allegedly controversial remarks against Pakistan.
Earlier, in a now-deleted video, Sharmishta had criticised Bollywood actors for their silence on the Pahalgam terror attack and India’s counter-terror strike, Operation Sindoor.
As per media reports, Kolkata Police has lodged an FIR against the social media influencer under Sections 196(1) (a) (promoting enmity between different groups on grounds of religion, race, place of birth, residence, language, caste, or community), 299 (deliberate and malicious acts intended to outrage the religious feelings of any class of citizens), 352 ( intentional insult with the intent to provoke a breach of peace), and 353(1)(c) (statements that incite public mischief) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita.
