The Supreme Court on Wednesday, 27 January, observed that freedom of speech is not absolute during its hearing on pleas seeking a stay on FIRs against the actors and producers of Tandav. A bench, headed by Ashok Bhushan, said the petitioners should go to the high courts to seek quashing of these cases.
The Supreme Court also rejected the petitioners’ request to grant interim protection to the makers of Tandav and its actors who have been named in the FIRs from arrest by police departments of six states, including Uttar Pradesh. “We cannot use the power under Section 482 CrPC. We are not inclined to grant interim protection,” Live Law quoted the bench as saying.
Multiple FIRs and criminal complaints have been filed against Tandav director Ali Abbas Zafar, the show’s writer Gaurav Solanki and actors Saif Ali Khan and Mohammed Zeeshan Ayyub in Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Karnataka and Maharashtra alleging that the web series has hurt religious sentiments. Among the scenes that have…