Chennai: A Habeas Corpus petition, seeking to produce Kovan, propagandist singer of an ultra left outfit, who was arrested last week for alleged sedition, was dismissed by the Madras High Court on Monday, holding there was no illegality in the detention.
Rejecting the contention of his petitioner-friend Venkatesan that the arrest of Kovan was in violation of law since he was not produced before any court, the HC dismissed the petition.
The division bench, comprising Justices R Sudhakar and Justice P N Praash, recorded the submission of the Additional Public Prosecutor who produced before it a copy of the FIR.
The APP submitted that a case was registered on October 28 under Sections 124A, 153, 505(i)(b) and (c) of IPC and also that Kovan had been remanded to judicial custody by the Chief Metropolitan Magistrate in Egmore.
"In the above circumstances, as is evident from the records that the respondent police had taken recourse to law by registering the FIR as prescribed under law, by no stretch of imagination it could be stated that he is in illegal custody. Therefore, no case is made out for grant of the relief as sought for. Accordingly, the petition fails and is dismissed."
Kovan, a 54-year-old propagandist singer of ultra Left arts and literary outfit 'Makkal Kalai Ilakkiya Kazhagam', was arrested at Tiruchirapalli on October 30 for alleged sedition, uploading defamatory electronic content against Chief Minister Jayalalithaa and disturbing public peace.
The alleged defamatory content in the form of videos were uploaded in some Tamil websites and it also went viral in messaging mediums like Whatsapp.
The content, though centred over the liqour vending policy of Tamil Nadu government, had direct references to Jayalalithaa in a bad light.
