‘A citizen’s right to liberty has been infringed’: SC grants bail to Prashant Kanojia

The Supreme Court today granted bail to freelance journalist Prashant Kanojia, who was arrested on June 8 for a tweet that “defames” Uttar Pradesh chief minister Yogi Adityanath.

The bench of Justice Indira Banerjee and Justice Ajay Rastogi passed the order in a habeus corpus petition filed by Kanojia’s wife, Jagisha Arora, seeking his release, LiveLaw reports.

Appearing for Uttar Pradesh, additional solicitor general Vikramjit Banerjee had submitted that the petition should not be entertained. According to Bar & Bench, Justice Banerjee said: “Arrest? A citizen’s right to liberty has been infringed. We have gone through the records … These sort of tweets should not be made, but arrest?” She added: “We do not appreciate these tweets, but can you put him behind bars for this?”

The court then ordered that Kanojia be released on bail.

On June 6, Kanojia had tweeted a video of a woman who claimed to have been in love in with the chief minister and was seeking a commitment from him. The freelance journalist, an IIMC alumnus who has worked with The Wire before, tweeted the video shot by TV channels and wrote “Ishq chupta nahi chupaane se yogi ji”.