Sunil Anand & Ors. vs State Of Jharkhand & Anr. on 16 February, 2017
From its perusal, it appears that whoever deliberately and with
malicious intention does an act of outraging of the religious feelings of
any class, offence under Section 295A gets attracted. Therefore, most
important ingredient for attracting the offence is deliberate and
malicious intention to cause hurt to the religious feelings of any class.
The case of the prosecution itself is that the religious rituals like that of
Tandav Dance was performed in an enclosed area and not in the public
place. In that event, act of the accused can never be said to be deliberate
nor can be said to have been done with malicious intention. Further, it
be stated that Tandav Dance seems to be an essential part of the
religious right, but it has been prohibited by the Hon'ble Supreme
Court to be performed in public places, which would appear from the
observation made in Para - 18 of the decision referred to herein above.
Thus, the question of committing offence under Section 295A of the
Indian Penal Code, in the facts and circumstances stated above, never
does arise. Same view has been taken by this Court earlier in a case of
"Acharya Chandradeo Sinha @ Chandradeo Sinha & Others-
versus-State of Jharkhand, [Cr.Rev. No. 488 of 2009]", which does
appear from para - 9 of the said judgment, which reads as follows:-