Mumbai : The Bombay High Court on Monday restrained Maharashtra government and police from taking any coercive steps, including arrest, agai-nst the Editor of an Urdu daily at the centre of a row over publishing the cover of French magazine Charlie Hebdo that featured a cartoon of the Prophet Muhammad.
The interim order was passed by a division bench of Justices Ranjit More and Anuja Prabhudesai on a petition filed by Shirin Dalvi, Editor of Urdu newspaper Awadhnama, whose Mumbai edition has been shut down following the publication of the cartoon last month.
Dalvi,46, a resident of Mumbra in nearby Thane district, has sought quashing of the cases against her and clubbing together all cases filed against her following the publication of the cartoon while she prayed for a direction to prevent the government and police from taking coercive action against her, including arrest.
The matter was adjourned till February 11 after Public Prosecutor S S Shinde sought time to seek instructions from the government on the relief sought by Dalvi.
The newspaper had reproduced the cartoon published in French Satirical magazine ‘Charlie Hebdo’.
