Gurgaon: A district court on Tuesday denied bail to a woman arrested over a social media video in which she purportedly claimed she had cooked beef and wanted to offer it to West Bengal’s “Hindu chief minister”.The case, lodged after objections from local residents and social media users, centres on allegations that the clip was intended to provoke and outrage religious feelings. The court remanded the 33-year-old woman from Bengal in judicial custody. She will remain in jail at least till the next hearing on June 8.Originally from South Dinajpur, the woman was arrested from Chakkarpur on May 30 after an FIR was registered at Sector 29 police station under Section 299 of the BNS, which deals with deliberate and malicious acts intended to outrage religious feelings.The complaint was filed by Dinesh Yadav, a Chakkarpur resident, who told police he had received a video on his phone in which a woman was speaking in Bengali about cooking beef and feeding it to Bengal’s newly elected chief minister, Suvendu Adhikari.In the clip, the woman, dressed in pink, is seen standing in a kitchen, cooking and addressing herself directly to the “CM of Bengal”. She purportedly says she has prepared beef, along with roti and rice, and offers it to the chief minister on camera. She also refers to restrictions on qurbani on Eid.The counsel for the complainant, Sundar Singh, said the case was registered on the basis of material collected during the probe. “The accused, in her statement, also admitted to recording the video in question. She was arrested and produced before a court on May 30. The court remanded her in judicial custody,” he said.On Tuesday, the woman moved a bail plea through her lawyer, but the court refused relief. Opposing bail, police argued that since she is from another state, she could leave the city and influence witnesses if released. Singh said the defence “did not complete its arguments and sought more time”.The case has drawn wider attention because it invokes Adhikari, who, after taking over as Bengal’s first BJP chief minister, banned the sale of beef in the state and ordered that no cows be slaughtered on Eid.
