Mumbai : The Maharashtra government on Tuesday informed the Bombay High Court that it has withdrawn its controversial circular issued on August 27 to prevent misuse of section 124-A of IPC which deals with sedition. State Advocate General Srihari Aney made this statement before a division bench of justices VM Kanade and Shalini Phansalkar Joshi, in response to two petitions challenging the constitutional validity of the circular.
Justice Kanade sought to know as to how the circular was issued. To this, the AG replied that the state government would conduct an exercise to find out how this happened. He also informed that CM Devendra Fadanvis, at a recent meeting of officials at Mantralaya, had decided to withdraw the circular. However, the AG did not mention whether the government would come out with a fresh circular. Outside the court, Aney told reporters that it was for the government to decide whether it will issue fresh circular. The High Court had earlier restrained the government from acting on the circular.