In a relief to actor Salman Khan, the Bombay High Court on Monday quashed proceedings against him in a magistrate’s court on a private complaint seeking contempt action for posting court orders on his website concerning his criminal cases.
Allowing Salman’s petition for quashing the complaint, Justice Sadhana Jadhav said she was inclined to impose Rs 2,000 cost on the complainant, Hemant Patil, for wasting the time of the court as the case for contempt was not made out.
Salman’s lawyer Ravi Kadam argued that the complaint was frivolous and urged that costs should be imposed. However, the complainant’s lawyer Wajed Khan submitted that his client had moved the court against the actor in public interest.
Justice Jadhav observed that prima facie it appears that the complaint was filed to gain publicity in the media and hence the court was inclined to impose costs.
Salman’s lawyer pleaded that the 2002 hit-and-run case involving the actor had been committed to a sessions court for trial and hence the magistrate had no jurisdiction to issue notice to him on the contempt complaint.
Salman pleaded that he had created the website only to ensure that there was no incorrect reporting by the media.
The Bandra magistrate had issued notice to the actor on July 10, 2013, while hearing a complaint filed by Patil alleging contempt of court action against Salman for allegedly posting court proceedings on website–www.salmankhanfiles.com.
The complaint alleged that Salman was embroiled in legal cases including the 2002 hit-and-run case and said that by posting court matters on the website, the actor had committed contempt of court as the matters were sub judice.
Salman, however, pleaded that he had created a website only to ensure that there was no incorrect reporting by the media and that the website gave factual information about his cases and nothing beyond that. He said that no contempt had been committed by him.
The actor pleaded that the complaint and the summons issued to him may be quashed and set aside. He said the magistrate had not applied his mind on the complaint filed against him as he did not arrive at a prima facie conclusion that a case of contempt of court had been made out.
