Court modifies order, drops Quran distribution part

 A local court that had asked a Hindu girl to distribute five copies of the Quran as a bail condition modified its judgment on Wednesday. The court said she would not have to distribute the copies now.

"The court of Manish Kumar modified its judgment in which it had directed Richa Kumari to distribute five copies of the Quran to different institutions," Arvind Kumar Singh, a lawyer at the Ranchi district court, told IANS.

The investigating officer (IO) in the case moved the court on Wednesday seeking modification of the order.

"The IO has prayed the condition of donating the Quran by the petitioner (Richa) may be done away with because of difficulties in its implementation. The petition of the IO was forwarded to APP. The state has prayed to modify the condition. In view of the aforesaid submission by APP, this court modifies its order by dropping the additional condition of distribution of copies of the Quran by the petitioner," the court said.

The Ranchi District Bar Association boycotted Judge Manish Kumar Singh's court on Wednesday and will continue to do so on Thursday. "We kept ourselves away from the judicial process from court of Manish Kumar," Ranchi District Bar Association secretary Kundan Rakashan told IANS.

Richa Patel, 19, released on bail on the condition of distributing the Quran to five institutions had said she would move the high court against the order. She was to submit the receipt for the distributed copies to the court in 15 days.

"I shared a Facebook post. The person who shared it on Facebook should have been arrested first. I will appeal the order in the high court. Today I have been asked to distribute the Quran and tomorrow I may be asked to accept Islam," Richa had said on Tuesday.

A case had been registered at the Pithoria police station in Ranchi based on her Facebook post. She was charged with spreading communal hatred through her Facebook post and was arrested within three hours of the post. 

Her arrest had created resentment among Hindus and Hindu organisations took out a protest march. IANS