Ghaziabad Police to challenge Karnataka High Court's interim relief to Twitter India MD in Loni assault case

NEW DELHI: In a significant development in the Loni assault case, the Ghaziabad Police has decided to challenge the Karnataka High Court's order granting interim protection to Twitter India MD Manish Maheshwari before the Supreme Court, sources said on Monday.

SSP Ghaziabad Amit Pathak told reporters that the police will approach the top court against the Karnataka high court order.

Karnataka High court had earlier given interim protection to Twitter MD Manish Maheshwari. He was served notice twice to join the investigation, but he didn't join. Now, the Ghaziabad Police are saying that they are left with no other option except to approach the Supreme Court.

The Karnataka High Court had directed the Ghaziabad Police not to take any coercive steps against him.  In its order, the High Court also said that if Ghaziabad Police wants to examine the Twitter MD then it can do so through virtual mode. 

The Karnataka High Court was hearing Twitter MD's petition against the notice issued by Ghaziabad, UP Police under Sec 41A CrPC.  The Ghaziabad Police had filed FIR against nine entities, including Twitter India, in connection with the Loni incident.

The Ghaziabad Police had issued notice to Maheshwari in connection with the case where a man was thrashed & his beard chopped off in Loni.

Twitter Managing Director Manish Maheshwari's counsel informed Karnataka High Court that his client is living in Bengaluru. The counsel said that Supreme Court and High Court have said that statement can be recorded through video-conferencing but Ghaziabad Police wants his personal presence.

In the FIR, the Police had said, "There is no communal angle to the incident in Loni where a man was thrashed and his beard was chopped off. The following entities - The Wire, Rana Ayyub, Mohammad Zubair, Dr Shama Mohammed, Saba Naqvi, Maskoor Usmani, Salman Nizami - without checking the fact, started giving communal colour to the incident on Twitter and suddenly they started spreading messages to disrupt the peace and bring differences between the religious communities."