BEFORE THE HON’BLE COURT OF DELTA , INDICA

IN THE MATTER OF :

Prabhas
Vijay …………………………………………………………….. PETITIONER

V.

STATE ………………………………………………………….. RESPONDENT

WRIT PETITION (CRL ) NO . 124/2015

ON SUBMISSION TO THE HON’BLE HIGH COURT OF DELTA , INDICA

UNDER ARTICLE 226 OF THE CONSTITUTION OF INDICA , 1950

WRITTEN SUBMISSION ON BEHALF OF PETITIONER

STATEMENT OF JURISDICTION

The Petitioners have approached the Hon‟ble High Court of Delta under Article 226 of the
Constitution of Indica, 1950.

STATEMENT OF FACTS

1. Prabhas was a successful graduate from an esteemed college of Delta State of Indica.
Since college time, Prabhas was an active social worker. After passing the college, Prabhas

 joined an NGO namely Safal to give voluntary services to the downtrodden sect of the
society along with his regular job at MNC of his city. The NGO Safal, worked specially for
the women and children in the rural and remote areas who are deprived of their rights and
privileges and who are unaware of the same. Being connected to the NGO, Prabhas was
very active in providing help to the women and children who were deprived of education,
nutrition, also who were subjected to inequality and crime.
2. There were many instances where the Safal with active participation of Prabhas had
successfully inspired parents of girl child to give them permission to carry on their education
and sometimes Prabhas saved the married women from domestic violence or sexual abuse
and had ended up attaining justice for such victims.
3. After being associated for as long as 15 years with Safal, Prabhas became a prominent
member of NGO and was respected by the State Government for such a noble contribution
to the society. At various conferences and functions, Prabhas was awarded and
acknowledged for his noble work which he did for women and girl child.
4. In the year 2020, he came across a girl, named ‘Gudia’, of 9 years of age in village
Dalhousie, of Delta State, whose parent’s complaint against an elementary school teacher
‘Vijay’ who demanded bribe from the said girl and few more children of the said school for
admissions. Also, Prabhas noticed numerous irregularities done by the school administration,
which violated the Government Order regarding collection of fees from the economically
downtrodden students.
5. Eventually, Prabhas filed a case against the said schoolteacher Vijay for demanding bribe
from the students. Later, Prabhas came to know that the same teacher had molested three
girls including ‘Gudia’. The parent of other girl child ‘Baby’, who was molested by the same
teacher, had filed a complaint before the headmaster against sexual assault of their girl child.
But no action was taken by the school management against the said schoolteacher Vijay.
Thus, with the bonafide intention to pressurize the school authority, Prabhas posted the
entire incident of sexual assault done by the teacher along with details of the molested girls
and the accused schoolteacher Vijay on Facegood a social media platform. The post which
Prabhas wrote gave details about the names, class, division, school and address of the victim
girls.
6. The Home Minister of Delta state took cognizance of the post of Prabhas and directed
the Police authorities to register a case against the accused schoolteacher under section 10 of
Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act, 2012.
7. Police in turn lodged an FIR against said schoolteacher Vijay under section 10 of
Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act, 2012 at Police Station Dalhousie based on
said post on Facegood.
8. The Child Welfare Committee (CWC) ordered registration of an F.I.R. against Prabhas for
disclosing the identity of the victim of child sexual abuse under section 23 of the Protection
of Children from Sexual Offences Act, 2012. According to Prabhas, he was unaware that all
such minute details given in the post would attract Section 23 of the Protection of Children
from Sexual Offences Act, 2012. Later, after two days, noticing the details of the victims
available on a post he wrote, Prabhas deleted the

 post from Facegood. But before Prabhas could delete the post, the CWC had already
ordered for registration of FIR. Consequently, Police Station Dalhousie registered a case
under section 23 of the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act, 2012 against
Prabhas.
9. The police are still investigating the case but Prabhas has filed a Writ Petition under
Article 226 of the Constitution of Indica before the Hon’ble High Court of Delta,
challenging the registration of F.I.R. against him. The same is still pending; However, the
Court granted an interim order that Prabhas be not arrested till further order, while issuing
notice to the State of Delta.
10. Aggrieved by the registration of FIR against him, School Teacher Vijay also filed a Writ
Petition under Article 226 for quashing the FIR mainly on the ground that FIR cannot be
lodged based on social media report. The High Court of Delta admitted his petition and
issued notice to the State of Delta. Now, the petition filed by Vijay is listed for final hearing.

ISSUES RAISED

1) WHETHER THE WRIT PETITION BROUGHT BEFORE THIS COURT IS

MAINTAINABLE.

2) WHETHER QUASHING OF FIR BE DONE ON THE BASIS OF SOCIAL MEDIA

REPORT UNDER SECTION 23 OF POCSO ACT

3) WHETHER TWO WRIT PETITIONS CAN BE CLUBBED TOGETHER

SUMMARY OF PLEADINGS

1) WHETHER THE WRIT PETITION BROUGHT BEFORE THIS COURT IS

MAINTAINABLE?

The Writ Petition made in furtherance to the Honorable High Court due to the juvenile
board‟s inability to decide a question of law is maintainable under Article 226 of the
Constitution of India as: firstly, the jurisdiction of High Court can always be invoked;



 secondly, the Hon‟ble HC is well within its rights to accept the writ petition on application
from the petitioners and thirdly, existence of Alternative Remedy is no bar to file petition.

2) CAN QUASHING OF FIR BE DONE ON THE BASIS OF SOCIAL MEDIA REPORT

UNDER SECTION 23 OF POCSO ACT

Quashing of FIR can be done on the basis of social media reports considering the
intention of the accused . As in the above case it was just an omission of law on the part
of petitioner .

3) WHETHER TWO WRIT PETITIONS CAN BE CLUBBED TOGETHER

Depends on the facts of the cases. If the Grievances of the petitions are co-associated
with one another the Hon’ble Chief Justice of High court will allow the case to a single
judge to take up 2 distinct matters under 2 different Laws along for better administration of
justice..

WRITTEN PLEADINGS

1. WHETHER THE WRIT PETITION BROUGHT BEFORE THIS COURT IS

MAINTAINABLE?

1.1 Jurisdiction of HC under Article 226 can always be invoked.

I. It is humbly submitted before this Hon‟ble Court that whenever a question of law of
general public importance arises the jurisdiction can be invoked. The jurisdiction
conferred under Art. 226 on the High Court are corrective one and not a restrictive
one.2 A duty is enjoined upon the High Court to exercise its power by setting right the
illegality in the judgments is well-settled that illegality must not be allowed to be
perpetrated and failure by the High Court to interfere with the same would amount to
allowing the illegality to be perpetuated.3 It has been held in plethora of cases that
when the question of law of general public importance arises, the jurisdiction of High
Court can be invoked. In the present case, the issue involves matters of General Public
Importance and hence, entitled to be maintainable.
II. It is humbly submitted that the expression "substantial question of law"4 is not defined
in any legislation. Nevertheless, it has acquired a definite connotation through various
judicial pronouncements. A Constitution Bench of the Apex Court, while explaining
the import of the said expression, observed that:
“The proper test for determining whether a question of law raised in the case is
substantial would, in our opinion, be whether it is of general public importance or
whether it directly and substantially affects the rights of the parties and if so whether it
is either an open question in the sense that it is not finally settled by this Court or by the

 Privy Council or by the Federal Court or is not free from difficulty or calls for
discussion of alternative views.”5
III. In the present case, the question of law involved in appeal is of recurring nature which
has been raised in a plethora of cases. Hence, it is humbly submitted before this
Hon‟ble High Court of India that the matter involves substantial question of law and
IV. hence entitled to be maintainable.
V. The SC is not precluded from going into the question of facts under article 226, if it
considers it necessary to do so6. Article 226 uses the wording „in any cause or matter‟.
This gives the widest power to this court to deal with any cause or matter. It is, plain
that when the High Court reaches the conclusion that a person has been dealt with
arbitrarily or that a court or tribunal has not given a fair deal to a litigant, then no
technical hurdles of any kind like the finality of finding of facts, or otherwise can stand
in the way of the exercise of this power.

1.2. The Hon’ble HC is well within rights to accept the writ petition on application

from the petitioners

It is humbly submitted before this Hon‟ble Court that Section 53 of The JJ Act7 states
that:

“The High Court may, at any time, either of its own motion or on an application
received in this behalf, call for the record of any proceeding in which any competent
authority or Court of Session has passed an order for the purpose of satisfying itself as
to the legality or propriety of any such order and may pass such order in relation
thereto as it thinks fit”
Provided that the High Court shall not pass an order under this section prejudicial to
any person to any person without giving him a reasonable opportunity of being heard.

Although in the present case the Child Welfare Committee as wisely requested the High
Court‟s opinion due to the involvement of a substantial question of law, but even in
arguendo if the case had been decided by the Child Welfare Committee , this honorable
court had the full authority to call for the record of any proceeding.

1.3.The existence of an alternative remedy is no bar to file petition

I. It is humbly submitted before the Hon‟ble Court that the remedy under Article 226 of
the Constitution is discretionary remedy.8 The Court is vested with power to entertain
the petition where there occurs gross miscarriage of justice and effective remedy is not
available. This rule of exhaustion of the statutory remedy is not rigid but somewhat
flexible and it is primarily a matter of the discretion of the writ court.9 Reliance is
placed upon the decision in the case of Whirlpool’s Corp. v. Registrar of Trademarks
Marks10, in which it was held by the Apex Court that the jurisdiction of the High



 Court in entertaining a writ petition under article 226 of the Constitution would not be
affected although there exists alternative statutory remedies.
II. Lastly, it is submitted that a writ petition is maintainable when the lis involves a public
law character and when the forum chosen by the parties would not be in apposition to
grant appropriate relief. Question as to when discretionary jurisdiction is to be
exercised or refused has to be determined having regard to the facts and circumstances
of each case. No hard and fast rule can be laid down in this regard.

2) CAN QUASHING OF FIR BE DONE ON THE BASIS OF SOCIAL MEDIA

REPORT UNDER SECTION 23 OF POCSO ACT

I.) It is humbly submitted before the Hon‟ble Court that it was a mere negligence of fact
on the part of petitioner as he was not aware of the laws under section 23 of pocso act
which states

1) No person shall make any report or present comments on any child from any form
of media or studio or photographic facilities without having complete and authentic
information, which may have the effect of lowering his reputation or infringing upon
his privacy.

(2) No reports in any media shall disclose, the identity of a child including his name,
address, photograph, family details, school, neighbourhood or any other particulars
which may lead to disclosure of identity of the child:

Provided that for reasons to be recorded in writing, the Special Court, competent to try
the case under the Act, may permit such disclosure, if in its opinion such disclosure is
in the interest of the child.

(3) The publisher or owner of the media or studio or photographic facilities shall be
jointly and severally liable for the acts and omissions of his employee.

(4) Any person who contravenes the provisions of sub-section (1) or sub-section (2)
shall be liable to be punished with imprisonment of either description for a period
which shall not be less than six months but which may extend to one year or with fine
or with both.

II . In the present case it is observed that petitioner no 1 has been doing social work for
the past 15 years. He has been a part of an NGO for 15 years. In his 15 years of service he
has served many girls and women so his intentions are completely pure . Which is proof
that his conduct is fair and without any mal intention . When he came across gudia’s case
he was disturbed and he just wanted to provide her with justice while doing it he made a
small mistake by neglecting the facts mentioned under section 23 , when he got to know
about his mistake he immediately deleted the post from his face good account .His only
intention was to make people aware about gudiya case .

 III. Lastly, it is submitted that petitioner number 2 has been a part of a false allegation as G
Gudia’s parents were frustrated with the school so they indirectly targeted petitioner
number 2 in order to warn the school authorities . Petitioner no 2 didn't had any malicious
intentions .under section 400 IPC his reputation was defamed .He lost his job and suffered
financial loss .

III. WHETHER TWO WRIT PETITIONS CAN BE CLUBBED TOGETHER

The Grievances of both the petitions are co-associated and extensive with one
another .We humbly request Hon’ble Chief Justice of High court to allow the case to a
single judge to take up 2 distinct matters under 2 different Laws along for better
administration of justice it will also save time as it will avoid delay in judgement as by
clubbing both the writ petition the hon’ble court will be able to judge the case from all the
perspectives and it will be able to come to a conclusion in a bit easy manner .

It is urged before this Hon‟ble Court that undue sympathy to impose inadequate sentences
would do more harm to the justice system to undermine the public confidence in the
efficacy of law and society could not long endure under such serious threats.

WRIT PETITION April 29, 2013, Mr. Harish Salve, attorney had defended the applicant.
Accepting the petition, Supreme Court Judge TS Thakur and Sudhansho Mukhopadhya
ordered that the petition would require a simultaneous hearing with “Shreya Singhal against
Union of India.

Prayer

Wherefore in the light of the issues raised, arguments advanced and authorities cited, it is
humbly requested that this Hon‟ble Court may be pleased to adjudge and declare:

The writ petition filed as maintainable,

The petitioner no 2 lost his job due to the false allegation imposed on him due to which he
suffered a lot of mental trauma also his financial condition deteriorated .
Hence , we pray to the Hon'ble court to direct order for petitioner no 2 to resume his job with
full dignity until and unless proven guilty .

Petitioner no 1 lost his goodwill which he made in past 15 years . Hence we request the hon'ble
court to quash the FIR filed against him .

And pass any such order, other order that it deems fit in the interest of Justice, Equity and
Good Conscience.
And for this, the Petitioner as in duty bound, shall humbly pray.

 COUNSEL ON BEHALF OF THE PETITIONER