India's Supreme Court Wednesday granted bail to a leading Muslim journalist who was arrested last month on charges of hurting religious sentiments through one of his tweets.
A two-judge bench of the top court gave the interim relief to Mohammed Zubair, the co-founder of Alt News, saying his "continued detention is not justified". "Ensure Zubair is released from custody by 6pm," it said.
The court also ordered that multiple FIRs filed against him in Delhi and the northern state of Uttar Pradesh be clubbed together and the cases be transferred to Delhi. "The bail applies to any future FIRs against him."
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Zubair's recent tweets highlighting the comments of BJP spokespersons allegedly insulting the Prophet Muhammad prompted many Muslim countries to lodge protest and led to countrywide demonstrations.
The Muslim journalist was arrested in the last week of June. Subsequently, multiple FIRs were lodged against him in Uttar Pradesh and the national capital. He had earlier got bail in some of these cases.
Alt News is a popular fact-checking website that has been quite critical of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi's Bharatiya Janata Party government. Alt News was founded in the year 2017.