The Supreme Court on Friday declined to halt the ongoing investigation in multiple FIRs lodged against Aumkareshwar Thakur, the alleged creator of the "Sulli Deals" apps, purportedly used for an online auction of several Muslim women.
A bench of Justices Sanjay Kishan Kaul and M M Sundresh, however, agreed to examine his plea for clubbing of FIRs, and issued notice to the states of Uttar Pradesh, Delhi, Maharashtra and others on his writ petition.
The bench said the each aggrieved woman can file a separate complaint in the matter.
"There are two websites. One is Sulli Deals and other is Bulli Bai. Can that be said to be conjoint?There are multiple uploads. Each person would have filed independently. Can it be called same offence? All of the FIRs are different as there has been multiple uploads," the bench said.
On a plea by counsel for Thakur for stay on the investigations, the bench said it would only issue notice as it had doubts for now on the halting the probe.
The petitioner claimed his plea was covered by T T Anthony’s judgement on clubbing multiple FIRs, arising out of the same cause of action.
The plea by accused Thakur was filed on January 24 this year praying for clubbing of various FIRs filed throughout the country with respect to offences relating to app namely 'Sulli deal of the day’. He faced FIRs in New Delhi, Noida, and Mumbai.
The app had created a major uproar last year for targeting Muslim women and uploading their images without their consent.
The plea claimed that the successive registration of FIRs in Delhi, Uttar Pradesh and Maharashtra is beyond the purview of Sections 154 and 156 of CrPC and is a case of abuse of statutory power by different investigating agencies.
The first FIR was registered on July 7, 2021, by the special cell of the Delhi Police under Section 354-A (3) of the IPC, alleging that ‘Github’, a hosting platform, has created portal namely ‘Sulli deal of the day’ and that they have uploaded hundreds of pictures of women on their platform without their consent.
According to Delhi police, one Neeraj Bishnoi, arrested in connection with portal Bulli Bai, disclosed the petitioner’s name and alleged he was behind the creation of the ‘Sulli deal of the day’. Thakur was arrested from his residence in Indore on January 8, this year.