Supreme Court grants interim bail to Mohammed Zubair in Sitapur case

The Supreme Court 's vacation bench has granted five-day interim bail to Alt News co-founder Mohammed Zubair in the hate speech case registered in Uttar Pradesh's Sitapur.

However, he will reportedly remain in jail as he didn't get relief in a Delhi case. The interim bail was granted on conditions that Zubair won't post any tweets or leave the jurisdiction of the Delhi magistrate.

The Alt News co-founder's plea challenges the Allahabad High Court's refusal to quash the FIR that says he hurt religious sentiments with his tweet.

The bail is an interim order as the Supreme Court will next hear the matter after five days. This comes a day after a local court in Sitapur denied him bail and sent him to police remand.

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The UP government argued that he was being taken to Bengaluru, where he lives, in police custody so any bail should be given only after that . It also underlined that he is in judicial custody in a case in Delhi. But the Supreme Court said, “We are dealing with only the UP police case. The matter be listed before the appropriate bench next week.”

Mr Zubair had gone to the Supreme Court yesterday, citing death threats. As he sought an urgent halt to the case, the court listed it for urgent hearing in a day. The Allahabad High Court had on June 10 said it was too early for it to intervene.

Alt News Co-founder Mohammed Zubair was arrested on June 27 and sent to one day of police custody after a First Information Report (FIR) was registered against him based on a Twitter posting, which another Twitter handle alleged "hurt Hindu sentiments." The contentious tweet by Zubair was posted in March 2018.

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