‘Don’t want any publicity’: Gujarat HC after Mahesh Langa withdraws plea

The Hindu journalist Mahesh Langa has withdrawn his petition challenging his police custody in the Gujarat High Court.

The journalist had approached the court last week. The court had asked the state’s counsel to get instructions by October 14. On Monday, the court allowed the journalist’s request to withdraw the petition.

The journalist was arrested last week for alleged GST fraud after an FIR was lodged against several individuals and entities, including a firm allegedly owned by the journalist’s cousin Manoj Kumar. It has been alleged that the company is among a network of 200 entities which tried to evade tax duties through fraudulent transactions. 

After granting permission to withdraw the plea, Justice Sandeep Bhatt in an oral remark asked Langa’s counsel why the case was so publicised. 

The counsel said Langa was a senior editor. “Every citizen is a citizen. We don’t want any publicity, at least during the course of adjudication,” said the judge in an oral remark. “This is not proper. He may not be interested in that publicity but whoever is behind it…entire petition is being published. That should not happen. It’s not a healthy practice. If you’re a politician, reporter or some normal citizen, court of law is court of law. It’s on merit. Why such extra hue and cry? I have given immediate circulation to you.”

The counsel replied saying there was nothing against the court, to which the judge remarked, “It amounts to that. Not by you but by whoever is trying to make such an attempt.”

Seen as an independent voice, Langa has been reporting on Gujarat for the last two decades and has reported on politics and public issues such as unemployment.

The Press Club of India, the Indian Women’s Press Corps, the Delhi Union of Journalists and the Press Association had earlier expressed concern at Langa’s custodial interrogation.

According to a report in The Hindu, Langa’s counsel Vedanta Rajguru told another court on Wednesday last week that the journalist is neither a director nor promoter of the company, DA Enterprise, which has been named in the FIR. 

In the remand application, police said that he was running DA Enterprise in the names of his relative and wife. But Rajguru reportedly argued that the police case hinged on a statement made by Manoj Langa that he carried out the transactions on the instructions of Mahesh Langa. “There is no transaction, signature in Mahesh’s name,” Rajguru said, according to The Hindu.

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