A court in Delhi has allowed police to withdraw a sedition case filed in 2019 against, Shehla Rashid, a former Jawaharlal Nehru University Students Union (JNUSU) leader, for her tweets on the Army.
Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Anuj Kumar Singh passed the order on February 27.
The prosecution in its petition claimed that Delhi Lieutenant Governor V K Saxena has withdrawn his sanctions to prosecute Rashid on the recommendation of a Screening Committee.
What was the case about?
Rashid in a tweet on August 18, 2019 alleged that the Army personnel were entering the houses of locals and torturing them. The Army rejected her allegation as baseless.
An FIR was filed against Rashid at the Special Cell police station in New Delhi based on a complaint by a person named Alakh Alok Srivastava. She was accused of promoting enmity between different groups and indulging in acts prejudicial to harmony through her tweets.
The charges framed against her, including sedition, promoting enmity between different groups and inciting riots, carried a maximum punishment of life imprisonment.
Changed stance
Once a steadfast critic of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Rashid recently heaped praise on the Union government for ensuring peace in Jammu and Kashmir.
"All of those things, somebody needed to break the ice, and for that, I would like to credit the present government, especially the Prime Minister and the Home Minister," she had said in a 2023 interview to ANI.
