Madras high court quashes FIR against cartoonist Bala – Times of India

MADURAI: The Madras high court has quashed an FIR registered against cartoonist G Balamurugan alias Bala on the ground that there was no criminality involved in the case.
Bala posted a cartoon on his Facebook page to express his anger and grief over the self-immolation of four members of a family on Tirunelveli collectorate premises on October 23, 2017, after being troubled by a money lender demanding exorbitant interests.
The cartoon depicted the then chief minister Edappadi K Palaniswami, then Tirunelveli district collector Sandeep Nanduri and then Tirunelveli city commissioner of police Kapil Kumar Sarathkar in an “inappropriate manner”.
Based on the complaint of the collector, a case was registered against him by the district crime branch police. He was arrested, and a court released him on bail. Bala filed the present petition before Madurai bench of the high court in 2017, seeking to quash the FIR.
Justice G Ilangovan observed that freedom of thought, expression and speech are the foundations upon which democracy survives, without which there can be no democracy and, therefore, no evolution of the human society. However, freedom of thought and expression is subject to the limitations that have been set out in the Article 19(2) of our Constitution.
The judge said the petitioner wanted to express his anger and grief over the inability of the administration, both the executive and police, in containing the collection of exorbitant interest by money lenders.
“The perception of looking at the cartoon differs from person to person depending on their ability to see a particular event in a particular dimension. The cartoon was only with reference to the inability of the authorities to act in the aid of the society. So here, the intention of the petitioner is not to defame the authorities, but to expose the gravity of the issue involved,” observed the judge.