Karnataka High Court Quashes FIR against the administrator of an X account for reposting a news report on an alleged stalking incident in Puttur, and directs the police to stop mechanical registration of FIRs and arrests over social media posts.
Bengaluru: The Karnataka High Court has quashed an FIR registered under Section 353(2) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023 against the administrator of the X handle ‘Karnataka Portfolio’, who had shared a report on an alleged knife-threat and stalking incident in Puttur, and has issued guidelines to the police against registering successive FIRs on the same incident and arresting as a matter of course [Sandeep Kumar v. State of Karnataka and Another].
Justice M. Nagaprasanna allowed the criminal petition filed under Section 528 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023 (BNSS), and directed the Director General and Inspector General of Police to ensure strict compliance with the guidelines.
How the case reached the Court
The petitioner, administrator of the ‘Karnataka Portfolio’ account, had shared a post headlined ‘Law and Order under Fire: Six held after Hindu woman alleges knife threat in Puttur’, which carried a news report of an incident of 8 July 2026 at Purusharakatte in Puttur taluk, Dakshina Kannada. According to the report, a woman was allegedly threatened with a knife and then followed by a group of youths in an SUV. The incident is stated to have been captured on CCTV, and six young people were taken into police custody. The woman is not named in this report.
The second respondent, Mahammad Shahanawaz, complained to the Puttur Town Police that the post targeted him and his friends and was aimed at creating chaos and communal tension. Crime No. 88 of 2026 was registered against the petitioner under Section 353(2) of the BNS and a notice under Section 35(3) of the BNSS was issued to him. The petitioner then learnt that seven crimes, Crime Nos. 82 to 88 of 2026, had been registered at the same police station over the same incident.
The petitioner’s case was that he had only re-shared information already in the public domain, did not name any religious group and was not the originator of the publication. The State argued that the post contained statements that could create disharmony and that the investigation should continue. These are the contentions of the parties and the Court did not examine the truth of the underlying allegations about the incident.
The legal position
Section 353(2) of the BNS, which corresponds to Section 505 of the Indian Penal Code, penalises circulating a statement or report containing false information, rumour or alarming news with intent to create or promote, or which is likely to create or promote, feelings of enmity, hatred or ill-will between different religious, racial, language or regional groups, castes or communities. Relying on Supreme Court rulings including Bilal Ahmed Kaloo v.
State of Andhra Pradesh, the Court noted that the offence requires the involvement of at least two groups or communities and cannot rest on feelings of one group alone. The Court also referred to the Supreme Court’s decision in Satender Kumar Antil v. CBI on the safeguards in Section 35 of the BNSS and to the Telangana High Court’s guidelines in Nalla Balu v. State of Telangana, which the Supreme Court declined to interfere with.
What the Court said
The Court found that the complaint and the post did not name any religious group and that the ingredients of the offence were not made out. It also criticised the registration of repeated crimes on a single incident:
“Since crime after crime is registered by the very Police Station on an incident of reporting of a particular act, it is shocking as to how for the asking, the crimes are registered by the jurisdictional police on the same incident without there being any ingredient of crime and without holding any preliminary inquiry.”
The guidelines
To prevent mechanical registration of crimes, multiplicity of proceedings and arbitrary use of police powers, the Court directed the jurisdictional police, subject to the BNSS and the law laid down by the Supreme Court, to: examine whether the allegations disclose the essential ingredients of the offence before registering a case on a social media post; ascertain whether a crime already exists on the same incident and not register a fresh one merely because the complainant is different; consider a preliminary inquiry under Section 173(3) of the BNSS where permissible; and examine the specific ingredients of Section 353(2) of the BNS before invoking it. On arrest, the Court said:
“Registration of a crime shall not automatically result in arrest.”
The Court added that wherever the statutory conditions for arrest are not met, the procedure of a notice under Section 35(3) of the BNSS must be followed, and that ‘mere criticism or expression of disagreement shall not be mechanically brought within’ the ambit of Section 353(2). The Director General and Inspector General of Police was asked to circulate the principles to all police officers through administrative instructions.
Why the judgment matters
The ruling applies the settled position that an FIR which, taken at face value, discloses no offence cannot be sustained, and extends it to a pattern the Court described as crime after crime on a single incident. It also puts into the form of directions the principle that the power to arrest is distinct from the need to exercise it.
For news platforms and social media users in Karnataka, the guidelines set a benchmark that police must follow before invoking Section 353(2) of the BNS. The order concerns only the FIR against the petitioner and expresses no view on the merits of the underlying allegations about the Puttur incident, which the Court did not adjudicate.
Case Title: Sandeep Kumar v. State of Karnataka and Another [Criminal Petition No. 13010 of 2026]
Bench: Justice M. Nagaprasanna, Karnataka High Court
Date of Order: October 16, 2026 (reserved on September 25, 2026)
Appearances: Girish Bharadwaj, Advocate, for the petitioner; Deepthi Alva, High Court Government Pleader, for the State; respondent No. 2 served and unrepresented