Karnataka High Court quashes FIR against man who sent out wedding invites with 'Vote for Modi' message

The Karnataka High Court on Tuesday quashed the First Information Report (FIR) and all consequent criminal proceedings initiated against a man who printed a message on his wedding invitation card asking people to vote for Prime Minister Narendra Modi in the 2024 parliamentary elections..Justice M Nagaprasanna allowed the quashing petition filed by the accused, one Shivaprasad, a resident of Dakshin Kannada district.The Court also quashed all proceedings against co-accused, one Balakrishna A, the owner of the card printing agency that had printed Shivaprasad’s wedding invitation cards.A detailed order of the Court is awaited..On November 11, Justice Nagaprasanna had granted an interim stay on the FIR."The petitioners/ accused are alleged of a strange offence. The first petitioner prints an invitation card of his own wedding and prints a posts script which read as the 'the gift that you would give me in the marriage is vote for Narendra Modi'. This is said to be an offence under Section 127A of the Representation of the People Act, 1951," the Court had said at the time..Shivaprasad was booked by the police under Section 188 (disobedience to public servant's order) of the Indian Penal Code and Section 127A of the Representation of People Act (RP Act) on April 25 this year after the election officer, one Sandesh KN, registered a complaint against him..As per the complaint, in the invitation cards for his wedding, Shivaprasad had printed a line saying, “Voting for Modi is the gift for my wedding.”This, the complainant had said, was in breach of the election of code of conduct rules.In his petition filed through advocate Vinod Kumar, the petitioner claimed that his invitation card was printed on March 1 this year, which was much before the time that the code of conduct was imposed in light of the 2024 parliamentary elections..The Election Commission had declared the calendar of events for the 2024 Lok Sabha elections only on March 16 and the complaint was made by the respondent election officer around a month after that on April 19, the petitioner said.The petitioner’s counsel also argued that the RP Act is applicable only when the code of conduct is in effect. He further said that the Magistrate failed to comply with the provisions of Code of Criminal Procedure and thus, the FIR registered against him was “bad in law.”