Court allows Delhi Police to withdraw sedition case against Shehla Rashid

A Delhi court has allowed the Delhi Police to withdraw a 2019 sedition case against former Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) student leader Shehla Rashid for her controversial social media posts on the Indian Army.

Chief judicial magistrate Anuj Kumar of the Patiala House Court on February 27 allowed the application moved by the Delhi Police Special Cell.

The application moved by the assistant public prosecutor on February 15, under Section 321 of the erstwhile Code of Criminal Procedure, which allows the prosecution to withdraw a particular case against a person, states that the Delhi lieutenant governor (LG) has approved the recommendation of a screening committee which examined the case lodged against Rashid and recommended the withdrawal of the prosecution.

The LG granted the approval for withdrawal on December 23 last year, according to the application.

Rashid had on August 18, 2019, in a series of posts, accused the Indian Army of purportedly entering the houses of locals in Jammu and Kashmir after the state was placed under lockdown following the revocation of Article 370 on August 5, 2019.

The Indian Army had strongly denied the claims as baseless and unverified. The Delhi LG at the time had said that Rashid’s posts were aimed at creating religious fault lines in Jammu and Kashmir.

The Delhi Police had lodged a case in September 2019 against Rashid under sections pertaining to sedition and promoting enmity between different communities, based on a complaint filed by Supreme Court advocate Alakh Alok Shrivastava.

In 2023, Delhi LG VK Saxena had granted sanction to prosecute Rashid, following a recommendation by the Delhi Police and the home department.

In its recommendation, the Delhi home department had claimed that the false allegations against Indian Army made it a serious issue and that her remarks warranted prosecution.