New Delhi:
The Supreme Court today issued notice to the Uttar Pradesh government on the arrest of well-known Dalit scholar Kamal Bharti for a Facebook post criticising IAS officer Durga Shakti Nagpal's suspension.
Kamal Bharti was arrested earlier this month after he wrote in support of the IAS officer and criticised the state's powerful Urban Development Minister Azam Khan. He was later released on bail as the magistrate found no merit in the allegations against him.
Mr Bharti had written in his post that while Ms Nagpal was suspended and charged with endangering communal harmony by ordering the alleged demolition of the wall of a mosque, no official was penalised for demolishing a Madarsa, or Islamic school, in another district around the same time.
He said that was because the Rampur demolition was ordered by Azam Khan. An aide of the minister later filed a police complaint accusing Mr Bharti of promoting disharmony between two religious groups.
The Uttar Pradesh government has been given four weeks to explain why it arrested Mr Bharti.
The state government is already under fire for suspending Ms Nagpal, seen as an upright officer who had taken on the illegal sand mining mafia in the state.