“The matter will be listed tomorrow”: with those words the Delhi High Court on Thursday turned down an urgent same-day hearing of a woman journalist’s plea for interim protection from arrest in the ACP Vivek Bhagat SC/ST Act case.
New Delhi: There will be no hearing today for a woman journalist who wants interim protection from arrest in an FIR lodged on the complaint of Delhi Police Assistant Commissioner of Police Vivek Bhagat under the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita and the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act. The Delhi High Court on Thursday refused to take up the ACP Vivek Bhagat SC/ST Act case plea the same day and said it would be listed the next day [Plea by woman journalist for interim protection in FIR on ACP Vivek Bhagat’s complaint].
The plea was mentioned before a Division Bench of Acting Chief Justice Nitin Wasudeo Sambre and Justice Sanjay Sharma, which said: “the matter will be listed tomorrow.” Reports do not give the journalist’s name, her counsel or the case number.
What the FIR alleges
Three people are named in the FIR: the journalist and two others. It invokes Sections 221 (obstructing a public servant), 356(2) (defamation) and 3(5) (common intention) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, along with provisions of the SC/ST Act. The complaint says the journalist and her colleagues publicly humiliated ACP Bhagat and used casteist slurs while he was on duty at a protest against Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar.
Her version
She gives a different account. According to her, she was filming an activist’s detention at the protest when the officer touched her inappropriately and pushed her, and she has accused him of sexual harassment. No FIR has been registered on her complaint.
The legal question likely to arise
Anticipatory bail is barred for offences under the SC/ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act by Section 18, but the Supreme Court has held that the bar does not apply where the complaint does not disclose a prima facie case under the Act. Courts hearing such pleas therefore begin by asking whether the ingredients of an atrocities offence appear on the face of the FIR. That is the question the High Court is likely to face when it takes up the plea.
Part of a larger set of cases
Several cases have reached the courts from the Delhi protests against the Chief Election Commissioner, and this plea is one of them. In a separate line of cases, the Supreme Court is hearing petitions by journalists’ bodies about the alleged assault and detention of reporters covering the October 10 and 11 protests.
Neither side’s allegations have been tested. No court has examined her account or the officer’s, the journalist is presumed innocent, and the High Court has expressed no view on the merits.
Case: Plea by woman journalist for interim protection in FIR on the complaint of ACP Vivek Bhagat (cause title and case number not reported)
Bench: Acting Chief Justice Nitin Wasudeo Sambre and Justice Sanjay Sharma
Date: October 15, 2026; listed for October 16, 2026