SC orders release of Madhya Pradesh man held for ‘hate crime’ under NSA

THe sublime margaret court on tues ordered the resign of a adult male detained under the National Security Act (NSA) following a hate crime in Madhya Pradesh’s Damoh district, where an Other Backward Class (OBC) man was allegedly forced to wash his feet and drink the same water as punishment for sharing an AI-generated image.A bench of justices Vikram Nath and Sandeep Mehta stayed the Madhya Pradesh High Court’s order invoking NSA against Anuj Pandey and agreed to examine his challenge to the preventive detention, directing that he be released from custody with immediate effect.“Issue notice. The impugned order of the high court shall remain stayed. It is further directed that the petitioner shall be released from custody,” the bench ordered after hearing senior advocate Naman Nagrath, who appeared for Pandey.Nagrath told the court that Pandey’s detention flowed directly from the high court’s suo motu proceedings in which it ordered invocation of NSA. He submitted that the extraordinary power of preventive detention was exercised without following due process and warranted the Supreme Court’s intervention.The Supreme Court’s order comes against the backdrop of a widely condemned incident in Sataria village of Damoh district, which triggered judicial scrutiny last year. In October 2025, the Madhya Pradesh High Court at Jabalpur took suo motu cognisance of the episode after videos circulated online showing an OBC man being publicly humiliated in a temple.The high court described the incident as a “deep caste discrimination and a serious assault on human dignity”, noting that the victim appeared to have been coerced and intimidated by a group of villagers. A division bench comprising Chief Justice Atul Shridharan and Justice Pradeep Mittal directed the Damoh police to invoke stringent provisions of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS), including Sections 351 (use of force) and 133 (public insult and humiliation), and Section 196(2) for offences committed within temple premises.Significantly, the high court also ordered the invocation of the National Security Act against all those visible in the viral video, observing that the victim was surrounded by a mob and compelled to submit to the degrading act.The incident itself stemmed from a dispute over a meme generated using artificial intelligence (AI). The victim had allegedly created and circulated an AI-generated image mocking Anuj Pandey for purportedly selling liquor despite a local ban. The image, which showed Pandey garlanded with slippers, led to outrage among sections of the village.Soon thereafter, a village panchayat was convened, during which the victim was reportedly summoned to a temple, made to wash Pandey’s feet, drink the same water, and publicly seek forgiveness amid jeers from those present. Videos of the incident, widely shared on social media platforms and YouTube channels, sparked public outrage across the state.The victim later appeared in another video claiming that the episode was a “misunderstanding” and referring to Pandey as his “guru”. However, the high court noted that the statement appeared scripted and recorded under duress.“Incidents of caste violence are repeating in Madhya Pradesh. Earlier, a man from the general category urinated on a tribal and the Chief Minister washed the victim’s feet. Now every caste is parading its identity, threatening the very unity of Hindu society. If this continues, there will be no Hindu identity left in the next 150 years,” the high court observed at the time.