HC grants bail to 8 Muslim men arrested for allegedly eating chicken biryani on Ganga

The Allahabad High Court on Friday granted bail to eight of the 14 Muslim men who were arrested after they organised an iftar party on a boat in the river Ganga and allegedly ate chicken biryani, reported Live Law.

The 14 men had been arrested after a video of the iftar party was widely shared on social media on March 16.

Eight of them moved the High Court after a session court in Varanasi denied bail to all the accused men on April 1.

They had also been denied relief on March 23 by Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate Amit Kumar Yadav, who said that the offences allegedly committed by the men were of “a serious nature and non-bailable”.

The eight men who were granted bail on Friday are Mohammad Azad Ali, Mohammad Tahseem, Nihal Afridi, Mohammad Tauseef, Mohammad Anas, Mohammad Sameer, Mohammad Ahmed Raza, and Mohammad Faizan.

All men accused in the matter face charges under the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita sections pertaining to defiling a place of worship with intent to insult the religion of a class, deliberate and malicious acts intended to outrage religious feelings of a class by insulting its religious beliefs and promoting enmity between groups.

They were also booked under sections pertaining to public nuisance, fouling water of a public spring or water reservoir,...

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