Mumbai: The Bombay High Court recently granted bail to three men arrested for the alleged murder of a Muslim youth in Pune in 2014 on the ground that the accused do not have any criminal record and were provoked “in the name of religion”.

Justice Mridula Bhatkar observed that “the fault of the deceased was only that he belonged to another religion. I consider this factor in favour of the applicants/accused. Moreover, the applicants/accused do not have any criminal record and it appears that in the name of religion, they were provoked and have committed the murder.”

The court’s order has shocked the family of Mohsin Shaikh, 28, a Pune techie, and his father Sadiq Shaikh, plans to approach the Supreme Court against the grant of bail to the three accused, according a report in the Indian Express.

The three main accused — Vijay Gambhire, Ranjeet Yadav and Ajay Lalge — who got bail from the court on Saturday were arrested following the murder of Mohsin on June 2, 2014 in Pune. The deceased, along with his brother Riyaz and colleague Wasim, was in the area to eat dinner after offering prayers at a mosque. But communal tension had built up after derogatory photographs of revered Maratha King Shivaji and Shiv Sena founder Bal Thackeray were uploaded on social media.

Following a meeting of right wing group Hindu Rashtra Sena (HRS) that evening in Hadapsar, Pune, when the group’s leader Dhananjay Desai made a ‘provocative’ speech that allegedly incited the spectators, there were violent protests. The accused, along with Desai, roamed the streets armed with weapons and on finding the victim, who was sporting a beard, along with others started assaulting them with hockey sticks, bats and stones, a police report said.

While Riyaz escaped, Mohsin, who was riding a bike, was badly beaten and when Riyaz returned he found his brother lying on the road. He sought help from passers-by. Mohsin was taken to a hospital but succumbed to his injuries.

Bhatkar said in her order, “The meeting was held before the incident of assault. The accused, otherwise, had no other motive, such as any personal enmity, against the innocent deceased.”

Except for HRS chief Desai, all the accused, including the trio who were identified after their arrest, have been released on bail either from the Sessions Court or the High Court.

According to the charge sheet, the HRS activists who had gathered at Gondhale Mala in Hadapsar at 8.30pm on that night “were carrying hockey sticks, wooden batons, etc. During the meeting, they started discussing that HRS president Dhananjay Desai has said that Muslims should be thrashed for posting derogatory pictures of Shivaji Maharaj on Facebook. Their vehicles, shops should be damaged. They should not be allowed to do any business in the area. There should be terror of HRS in Hadapsar.”