State of Tamil Nadu v. Suhas Katti (2004)

It is the first conviction under s. 67 of the Act, and it is the standard illustration of two things the paper tests: that obscene publication in electronic form is prosecuted under the Act itself, and that the Act's offence is charged together with the general penal law rather than instead of it — s. 77 in action, which provides that the remedies under the Act are in addition to and not in derogation of any other law.

Obscene, defamatory and annoying messages about a divorced woman were posted in a message group, and e-mails were forwarded to her from a false account opened in her own name. The postings brought her abusive telephone calls from men who believed she was soliciting. The accused was a family friend who had wanted to marry her.

A charge sheet was filed in March 2004.

The accused was convicted on 5 November 2004 and sentenced under s. 67 of the Act to rigorous imprisonment for two years and a fine of ₹4,000, the sentences to run concurrently with those on the Penal Code counts. The charges were laid under s. 67 of the Act together with ss. 469 and 509 of the Indian Penal Code — forgery for the purpose of harming reputation, and insulting the modesty of a woman.

Two features of the prosecution are what the course draws from it, and they are worth stating as a method rather than as doctrine.

1. Charge the special and the general provisions together. The conduct had several aspects: publication of obscene material in electronic form, which is what s. 67 reaches; the opening of a false account in the victim's own name, which is a Penal Code question; and the insult to her, which is another. Section 67 does not absorb them. Section 77 of the Act is the provision that makes this possible, and the candidate who cites it alongside the case has the structural point.
2. The medium does not change the offence, only the provision under which it is charged. Publication in electronic form is the trigger for s. 67; the wrong itself is the old one.

A third detail earns marks because it is unusual: the conviction came within about seven months of the first information report.

• On s. 67. Cite it as the first conviction under the section, and use it to show what "publishing or transmitting obscene material in electronic form" looks like in practice.
• On s. 77. This is the cleanest illustration in the course of cumulative remedies: s. 67 with ss. 469 and 509 of the Penal Code, sentences running concurrently.
• On the offences generally. Be accurate about the provisions that were not in issue. Section 66A is irrelevant to it and, in any event, was struck down on 24 March 2015; s. 67A and s. 67B were inserted later and were not charged.
• Update the general law. The Penal Code sections cited were the law as it then stood; the Penal Code has since been replaced by the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023, and an answer written today should say so and refer to the corresponding provisions of that Sanhita, while citing the case with the sections under which it was actually charged.

What it does not decide: it is a magistrate's conviction on its own facts, not an appellate ruling on the meaning of obscenity, and it lays down no test of what is obscene. Cite it for what happened, not for a proposition of law it never articulated.