Kolkata: The Calcutta High Court Monday quashed an arrest warrant issued against the Trinamool Congress’s Krishnanagar MP Mahua Moitra by a court in West Bengal’s Nadia district.
Besides quashing the arrest warrant issued against Moitra, a division bench headed by Justice Debangshu Basak also transferred the related case from the jurisdiction of the Krishnanagar district court to that of the MP-MLA court at Bidhannagar in North 24 Parganas district.
It also quashed the other related orders of the Krishnanagar District Court in this particular case.
The two-time Krishnanagar MP was accused of making controversial and insulting comments about the Indian Army and the Union Home Minister Amit Shah.
Apart from that, some of her comments on women wearing tulsi wood necklaces, burqa, and hijab also created controversy
A resident of Krishnanagar filed a case in connection with the remarks under several sections of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS), 2023 and the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita (BNSS), 2023.
The Krishnanagar MP was accused of degrading the modesty of women, besides inciting conflict between different religious groups, hurting religious sentiments and intimidating them. The Krishnanagar court had summoned Moitra several times in this case, but as she did not appear, an arrest warrant was issued against her.
Moitra approached the Calcutta High Court challenging the arrest warrant, and it had already given an interim stay on the implementation of the arrest warrant in the previous hearing.
The matter came up for hearing again Monday afternoon, and this time, the division bench quashed the warrant and also transferred the related case.
In fact, Moitra’s counsel Ark Nag had earlier raised the question of whether the Krishnanagar court had the jurisdiction to hear the case against her since she was an MP, and had argued that the related case against her should be heard in the MP-MLA court. The division bench accepted his argument.
