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The Supreme Court on Tuesday extended the protection from arrest granted to Indore-based cartoonist Hemant Malviya for his objectionable caricatures of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS).
Malviya's counsel said he would publish an apology on Facebook, Instagram and other social media platforms for his post. A bench of Justices Aravind Kumar and NV Anjaria said that Malviya should publish the apology within 10 days and extended the interim protection till the next date of hearing. Additional Solicitor General (ASG) KM Nataraj appearing for the Madhya Pradesh government said that the post should not be deleted because the investigation is ongoing. He said let Malviya publish apology on social media with an undertaking that he will not indulge in the same again and he may cooperate with the probe. Earlier, the top court had directed him to file the apology in Hindi in the form of an affidavit. The apex court was hearing an anticipatory bail of Malviya for his objectionable caricatures of PM and RSS. Madhya Pradesh High Court on July 3 had rejected his anticipatory bail plea. The High Court had said that Malviya had misused the freedom of speech and ought to have used his discretion while drawing the caricature in question. His plea has clarified that he had published the original cartoon during the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic, when social media was rife with misinformation and fear related to the safety and efficacy of the vaccines. The petitioner said his cartoon is a satirical caricature work which offers social commentary on the comments made by a public figure regarding some vaccines being effective and "safe like water", even though their efficacy remains untested through rigorous clinical trials. He further claimed that the caricature was the artist's imagination of a common man being vaccinated by a public representative and has been in public circulation on social media for over four years. It said that a social media user on May 1, 2025, had posted the cartoon with his comment stating "through implication that caste census is merely a tool to distract the public from issues like Waqf and Pahalgam". The petitioner claimed that Malviya shared that post to demonstrate that his cartoons are freely available for public use and expression, but he did not endorse the views expressed in the added commentary, and acknowledged the use of his cartoon. (ANI)
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