SSB Awareness Series: Non - Bailable warrant issued against MS Dhoni

Issue of a non-bailable warrant against MS Dhoni is the latest happening in the series of events that took place since the Business Today magazine came out in April, 2013. That edition of the magazine titled ‘God of big deals’ ,was on the brand value of the former test captain, portrayed Dhoni’s face morphed as Lord Vishnu holding multiple brands that are endorsed by him, specifically the sports shoes. This has put him in the troubled waters as he has been accused of hurting the religious sentiments.

Originally, a petition was filed against MS Dhoni and the magazine editor Chaitanya Kalbag by a Vishwa Hindu Parishad leader, Y. Shyam Sunder in Anantapur, Andhra Pradesh for denigrating the ‘Hindu God’ by posing as Lord Vishnu with multiple brands that he endorses. According to him, this symbolized showing disrespect to the Hindu God especially when Dhoni himself belongs to the same religion. He had initially urged the court to punish the accused under section 200 of the Criminal Procedure Code and section 295A, 298 and 499 of the Indian Penal Code. The petition was dismissed by the court on the account of absence of complainant.

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Therefore, Mr. Sunder filed a revised petition following which the court issued summons to both the cricketer and the editor to which neither of them responded. Because of this, the court issued bailable warrant against both of them. Although it is reported that the warrant was acknowledged by Dhoni with no reply from the editor end,      later on it was mentioned from Dhoni’ s lawyer that they have not received any such warrant. Seeing the string of events, the court finally issued a non-bailable warrant against both of them summoning them to report on February, 25. There are speculations that Dhoni may not actually turn up and rather request the High Court to redirect the case to lower court so that it can be somehow quashed.

In his defense, Dhoni had declared in September, 2015 that he never posed as God and his picture was morphed in order to come up with the cover page. He stated that he never took any remuneration or money for the news article or for the usage of his picture and hence, he has not shown any disrespect to any religious group. Whereas there have not been any statements from the editor side.

 It is obvious to think that any cricketer like Dhoni would have thought twice before doing something like that as this can outrage the people. And since the clarification has come that it was not done by Dhoni in any way, the high court should have understood the difference between an advertisement and the cover of a magazine before passing any moral judgments.  What I think is that it was not Dhoni’s fault that his image was used to sell the magazine which leveraged his brand value. In a place like India where cricket is treated like religion and cricketers are preached as God, the religious group should have shown some tolerance as far as this religious image tweaking is concerned and should not have responded to the cricket deity this way. If there is someone to be held responsible for this, it should be the magazine editor who should have thought twice before passing this cover considering the intolerance that people have in a country like India. What will happen in this case in the future is something there for every one of us to watch out.

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About the Author: Arshdeep Kaur is an Electronics and Communication Engineer who is working in one of the leading MNCs in Bangalore. Born and brought up in Delhi, she is exploring her interests in the areas of writing