SC refuses to entertain contempt plea against Stalin Jr over his controversial statements on ‘Sanatan Dharma’

New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Wednesday said that it would not entertain plea seeking contempt action against Tamil Nadu minister Udhayanidhi Stalin over his controversial statements on ‘Sanatan Dharma’

“If we start entertaining contempt, we will be flooded with it. We will not go into individual cases,” said a bench comprising of Justices Sanjiv Khanna and S.V.N. Bhatti as it heard a batch of pleas concerning hate speech in the country, including a plea seeking contempt action against Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M.K. Stalin’s son, Udhayanidhi Stalin.

The bench said that if it starts going into individual cases, it will not be able to deal with the main matter itself, adding that it will be “impossible” to hear individual cases across the country.

It remarked: “We cannot deal with individual aspects. What we will do is to put an administration mechanism in place and if there is any breach, then you will have to go to the respective High Court.”

It may be recalled that a bench comprising Justices Aniruddha Bose and Bela M. Trivedi in September had issued notice on a plea seeking directions for registration of an FIR against Stalin Jr. and the organisers of the ‘Sanatana Dharma Eradication Conference’.

In April this year, the top court had stressed that the Constitution envisages India as a secular nation, while directing all states and Union Territories to take strict action in hate speech cases and register criminal cases irrespective of religion against the culprits without waiting for a complaint to be filed.