Madras High Court keeps down the FIR against a man booked for criticising Late Gen. Bipin Rawat after his death and said it was a uncivil remark not IPC offence

The Madurai Bench of the Madras High Court has struck out an FIR registered against a man from Kanyakumari district for posting certain remarks on social media on the death of Chief of Defence Staff General Bipin Rawat.
The court was looking at the petition filed by G. Sivarajah Boopathi of Nagercoil. The cyber crime police, Nagercoil, registered a case against the petitioner and another person based on a complaint lodged by Dharmaraj.
The subject matter of the case was the post which said "it is disgrace to shed tears for "Dictator Bipin Rawat", the mercenary of the fascists". Based on a complaint, the Cyber Crime Police Station Nagercoil registered an FIR invoking Sections 153, 505(2) and 504 of IPC on December 15 against the author of the post and others who shared the post.
The accused approached the High Court under Section 482 of the Code of Criminal Procedure seeking to quash the FIR. In the judgment delivered on January 21, the High Court analyzed each of the provisions invoked in the FIR and observed that their ingredients were absent in the case.
The court observed that, 'The victim has not been directly insulted by the Facebook post of the accused. This post was for his Facebook friends. However, anyone can access it. Posted on 8th December and complaint filed on 15th December. It may be that the complainant himself saw it by chance or someone showed it to him. Therefore, section 504 of IPC also does not apply to the accused. Spreading enmity between 2 classes On Section 506 (2) of the IPC, the judge said, 'The post of the petitioner does not include 2 groups. Nor does it make any mention of religion, caste, place of birth, residence, language, caste or community.
There is nothing like trying to pit one group against another. Therefore, there is no ground to punish the petitioner in this case.
Justice Swaminathan further observed that, 'The petitioner deserves to criticize the legacy of CDS General Rawat, but his manner of criticism is not in accordance with Tamil culture. I wish that the petitioner should read that last chapter of Mahabharata when all the characters are dead and Yudhishthira is the last left to go. While entering heaven, he was surprised to see Duryodhana there. He got angry and started abusing Duryodhana. Then Narada interrupted him to do so and explained that, while living in heaven, all the enmity ended.
Don't say this about Duryodhana. However, I am not familiar with the ideological background of the petitioner. Maybe he is allergic to national epics.'
Next, the Court dealt with Section 506(2) IPC, which pertains to "Statements creating or promoting enmity, hatred or ill-will between classes". In this regard, the Court observed :
"The petitioner's post does not involve two groups at all. There is no reference to religion, race, place of birth, residence, language, caste or community. It has been held that unless one group is sought to be pitted against the other on the aforementioned grounds, the penal provision is not attracted".

The judge finally noted that Sivaraj Boopathi had been booked under Sections 153 (Provoking with the intention to cause riot), 505(2) (Statements creating or promoting enmity between classes), and 504 (Intentional insult with intent to provoke breach of the peace) of the IPC.