A Delhi court on Saturday pulled up the police for filing a sedition chargesheet against 10 people, including a few former JNU students, without the mandatory sanction for prosecution from the state home department or Union home ministry. You don’t have a legal department,” the court said. The police might appeal to Delhi lieutenant governor Anil Baijal to prod the home department to speed up the sanction, or seek the sanction from the Union home ministry, under which the force functions. This is the first sedition case to come before the Delhi home department since Sikh rights campaigner Simranjit Singh Mann was accused of the offence in 1985. Sanction for prosecution was granted but Mann was acquitted and later became an MP.

Source: The Telegraph January 19, 2019 21:56 UTC