A court in Gujarat's Valsad on Saturday rejected a plea by police seeking a three-day remand of Independent MLA Jignesh Mevani in connection with a case against him for allegedly sharing a "fake" video on social media and defaming a private school through it.
The court of Chief Judicial Magistrate Heena Desaai rejected the request of the Special Operations Group (SOG), Valsad, for Mevani's remand on ground that the lawmaker refused to hand over his mobile phone to police.
The court, however, directed the Vadgam MLA to remain present before it between 10 am and 5 pm on any day for questioning.
Mevani told the court he did not want to give any document to the police that could be used against him.
The MLA had on May 20 shared a video on his Twitter account, showing a half-naked school student being beaten up by someone, which he claimed, was a teacher of Valsad-based RMVM School.
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A case in this connection was registered in June against Mevani.
The SOG on Friday detained Mevani in Vapi where he was called for questioning.
While Mevani had already secured an anticipatory bail from the Gujarat High Court, he was issued a notice to remain present at the court in Valsad on Saturday afternoon.
The principal of the school, Bijal Patel, had lodged a complaint against the legislator at Valsad town police station, saying the video that he circulated did not belong to her school and that he defamed it and the teachers working there, police had said.
Based on her complaint, Mevani was booked under Indian Penal Code sections 505 (2) (promoting rumour to create ill will) and 500 (defamation).
In his May 20 post on the micro-blogging site, which has since been removed, Mevani had shared a link of the video and claimed that the teacher of Valsad's RMVM School was involved in thrashing a student. He had even tagged the PMO in his tweet posted in Hindi.
"Barbarism of worst form...do not leave behind a single WhatsApp number or group and forward this video to all.
"He is a teacher of Valsad's RM VM School. Share this so many times that both the teacher and school shut down. This is a message I received. @PMOIndia tell us what is this," he had posted.
Mevani apparently deleted the tweet after some Twitter users claimed that the video belonged to Egypt and not Gujarat.
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