NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Monday stayed the proceedings in a criminal case lodged against Tamil Nadu BJP president K Annamalai for allegedly delivering a hate speech against Christians in an interview to a YouTube channel in October 2022 with regard to bursting firecrackers.

After perusing the transcript of the statements given in the interview, a bench of Justices Sanjiv Khanna

and Dipankar Datta observed, “Prima facie, there is no hate speech. No case is made out.”

The bench issued a notice to the complainant, who has accused Annamalai of delivering a hate speech against Christians in the interview on October 22, 2022 with regard to the bursting of crackers.

“Issue notice returnable in the week commencing April 29, 2024. In the meanwhile, there shall be a stay on further proceedings before the trial court,” the bench said.

Senior advocate Siddharth Luthra and advocate Sai Deepak, appearing in the court on behalf of Annamalai, showed the transcript of the interview to the bench and said it is not a case of hate speech.

Annamalai moved the top court challenging HC order that had refused to quash the summons issued to him in the case.