Attempts to restrict Kangana Ranaut from sharing her views on Twitter may not be fulfilled as the Bombay High Court has slammed the petitioner seeking suspension of Twitter account of the Bollywood actress.
Recently, a criminal writ plea was filed by Mumbai-based lawyer Advocate Ali Kaashif Khan Deshmukh seeking directions to permanently suspend or deactivate her Twitter account in order to stop “spreading of continuous hatred and disharmony through extremist or derogatory tweets or remarks and attempting to divide the people and promote commission of crime in the country”.
In the previous hearing, the Maharashtra State government actually opposed the writ calling it unclear. A division bench of Justice S S Shinde and Justice M S Karnik was hearing a criminal writ plea. The court observed that the actor had the fundamental right to express her views through tweets albeit reasonable restrictions.
The bench asked the petitioner, “If you say that your fundamental right, Article 21 (right to personal liberty) is violated… Any individual can have such an account to express her views through tweets. You will have to show that reasonable restrictions (on freedom of speech) as per Article 19 (2) of the Constitution are violated by such tweets. Tell us how can you do that? Fundamental rights are not absolute.”
The next hearing on this writ will be on January 7.