Pune techie murder: SC slams Bombay HC for communal comment

The Supreme Court on Thursday cancelled the bail granted to three accused in a 2014 sensational murder of Pune-based techie Shaikh Mohsin and deprecated the Bombay High Court’s remarks that “the fault of the deceased was only that he belonged to another religion.”

A Bench of Justices S A Bobde and L Nageswara Rao quashed the High Court’s January 12 order granting bail to the accused allegedly belonging to the right wing Hindu Rashtra Sena. It said it was unable to understand the remarks passed by the High Court while granting the bail.

Allowing the appeal of Moshin’s brother, the Bench ordered that the accused be taken into custody and the High Court hear their bail application afresh within six weeks. “We have no doubt that a court, fully conscious of the plural composition of the country, while called upon to deal with rights of various communities, cannot make such observations which may appear to be coloured with a bias for or against a community,” the Bench said.

It went on to record in the order: “It is possible that the judge wanted to rule out a personal motive against the victim, but only emphasised communal hatred. It is also possible that the single judge may not have intended to hurt the feelings of any particular community or support the feelings of another community but the words are clearly vulnerable to such criticism. The direction cannot be sustained.

“The fact that the deceased belonged to a certain community cannot be a justification for any assault, much less a murder.” The High Court had taken another religion of the deceased as a factor in favour of the accused while allowing them the bail since they had no criminal record and “it appears that in the name of the religion, they were provoked and have committed the murder.”

Mohsin was assaulted and killed by a group of around 25 people for allegedly sporting a beard and wearing a pastel green-coloured shirt while on his way with a friend to have dinner.