Kunal Kamra Refuses to Apologise, Retract His Tweets on Supreme Court

In the wake of Attorney General KK Venugopal giving his consent to initiate criminal contempt proceedings against comedian Kunal Kamra based on some of his tweets about the Supreme Court, the comedian on Friday refused to apologise for his remarks and released a statement in response to several petitions filed against him.

The open letter was filled with sarcasm and made no apologies for his tweets on the Supreme Court. Kamra’s letter suggested that the apex court should focus on matters of more importance since “a time slot before the Supreme Court is a scarce commodity”.

“May I suggest the Demonetisation petition, the petition challenging the revocation of the special status of J&K, the matter of the legality of electoral bonds or countless other matters that are more deserving of time and attention. To slightly misquote Senior Advocate Harish Salve, Will the heavens fall if more salient mattes are allotted my time?” the letter read.

He mentioned that his views towards the Supreme Court were unchanged because the court’s silence on matters of others personal liberty cannot go uncriticised. “I don’t tend to retract my tweets or apologise for them. I believe they speak for themselves,” Kamra’s letter read.

Kamra had posted a series of tweets after the Supreme Court granted interim bail to Republic TV editor-in-chief Arnab Goswami, Feroz Mohammad Shaikh, and Neetish Sarda on a bond of Rs 50,000 each on Wednesday. Goswami, Shaikh, and Sarda were charged with abetment to suicide of Mumbai-based architect and interior designer Anvay Nayak and his mother in 2018, over the alleged non-payment of dues.

The Supreme Court was criticised for hearing Goswami’s bail plea out-of-turn and releasing him on an interim bail when the Bombay High Court refused him bail.

Kamra posted several tweets on the court’s alleged favouritism:

According to a report by Bar and Bench the comedian’s open letter came after Venugopal gave his nod to initiate criminal contempt proceedings against Kamra after two Pune-based lawyers and one law student wrote to him seeking his permission for the same.

In his letter to the law student, Venugopal wrote, “I believe it is time people understand that attacking the Supreme Court of India unjustifiedly and brazenly will attract punishment under the Contempt of Courts Act, 1971.”

“This is a gross insinuation against the entirety of the Supreme Court that it is not an independent and impartial institution and so too its judges, but on the other hand is a court of the ruling party, the BJP, existing only for BJP’s benefit,” the letter read.

The comedian, who calls himself a “propagandist masquerading as a comedian” signed off by saying, “The Supreme Court of India hasn’t yet declared my tweets anything as of now. But if and when they do, I hope they can have a small laugh before declaring them contempt of court. Also, in one of my tweets, I had asked for the replacement of the photo of Mahatma Gandhi at the Supreme Court of India with that of Harish Salve. I would like to add that Pandit Nehru’s photo should also be replaced with that of Mahesh Jethmalani.”

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