Union Home Minister Sushilkumar Shinde did not make the "Hindu terror" remark with any malicious intention and has already expressed regret for it, Delhi Police told a court here today.
Police made the submission in its status report filed in the court of Metropolitan Magistrate Viplav Dabas, who is hearing a plea seeking registration of FIR against Shinde for allegedly promoting enmity between different groups on grounds of religion by his remark.
The court has now reserved its order on the complaint made by RTI activist Vivek Garg for February 27.
In its status report, police said the CD containing Shinde's speech provided by the complainant "shows that there was no intention to link terrorism to any particular religion.
"It also shows that being the home minister of the country he has some investigation report. There is nothing specifically mentioned in the speech that he has used defamatory and derogatory words to cause ill will and hatred towards some specific religion."
It also said Shinde had not uttered any words with deliberate intention to wound religious feelings of any person or community.
"The latest development in Parliament is that the home minister issued a statement regretting his Hindu terror remark and stated that he had no intent to link terrorism to any religion. The Opposition party has welcomed his statement," the police said, adding that the complaint be dismissed.
Garg's counsel Ajay Goel, however, argued that "merely regretting for a remark does not absolve" the minister of his offence and regretting it amounts to confession of guilt.
"Whether the minister had any intention to hurt anyone's feelings or not does not matter as he made a comment which was widely reported and his statement has even given a boost to LeT founder Hafiz Saeed."
The complainant had sought registration of FIR against Shinde for "making imputations prejudicial to national integration, uttering words with deliberate intent to wound religious feelings of Hindus, defaming them, and insulting their religion and beliefs".
