Punjab & Haryana HC Quashes FIR Against Woman Who Dressed Her Dog as Lord Krishna on Janmashtami

Justice Subhas Mehla held that dressing a pet dog in Krishna’s attire for Janmashtami, posted as a WhatsApp status, disclosed no offence under Section 298 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023.

The High Court of Punjab and Haryana at Chandigarh has quashed an FIR and final report filed against Ranjanni Gaur, a bank manager from District Hoshiarpur, who dressed her pet dog in a yellow cloth, crown, morpankh, and other ornaments on the occasion of Janmashtami and uploaded a photograph as her WhatsApp status. Justice Subhas Mehla, sitting singly, found that neither the actus reus nor the mens rea required under Section 298 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023 (BNS) was made out. The court drew on Hindu scripture, constitutional guarantees, and a line of Supreme Court precedents to conclude that criminal proceedings cannot be sustained on the basis of subjective hypersensitivity where no deliberate or malicious intent exists.

The FIR and the Route to the High Court

FIR No. 67 dated 3 September 2024 was registered under Section 298 of the BNS at Police Station Talwara, District Hoshiarpur, following a complaint by a private complainant who identified himself as a youth leader of Shiv Sena. The complainant alleged that Gaur had hurt the sentiments of the Hindu community by dressing her dog to resemble Lord Krishna and posting the image as her WhatsApp status.

During investigation, Gaur's statement was recorded. She told investigators that she had been married for six years and had remained issueless, which is why she loved her pet dog and treated it as her child. About two to three days before Janmashtami, she dressed the dog with a crown associated with Shri Krishna and took a photograph on her mobile phone. On the day of Janmashtami, she posted that photograph as her WhatsApp status, stating she did not know the act would hurt any person's religious sentiments.

Upon completion of investigation, a final report under Section 193 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023 (BNSS) was filed before the trial court on 19 January 2025. Gaur then approached the High Court in CRM-M-11112-2025, seeking quashing of the FIR, the final report, and all consequential proceedings.

What Section 298 BNS Requires

Section 298 of the BNS — which re-enacts the erstwhile Section 295 of the IPC — punishes whoever destroys, damages, or defiles any place of worship or any object held sacred by any class of persons, with the intention of insulting the religion of any class of persons, or with the knowledge that any class of persons is likely to consider such destruction, damage, or defilement an insult to their religion. The maximum punishment is imprisonment for two years, or fine, or both.

The prosecution's case was that posting the dressed-dog photograph on Janmashtami disclosed this offence. The petitioner's position was that both limbs of the offence — actus reus and mens rea — were absent.

Petitioner's Three-Pronged Challenge

Counsel for the petitioner, Mr. Mitul Singh Rana, built the challenge on three grounds. First, the act was a bona fide expression of personal faith and devotion with no intention to insult or outrage religious feelings. Second, the prosecution rested on misplaced religious hypersensitivity and the subjective perception of a single complainant rather than any objective legal standard. Third, the FIR amounted to an abuse of process, politically motivated by a complainant seeking to gain political capital through a religious controversy.

On the actus reus point, counsel argued that the objects placed on the dog — a yellow cloth, a crown, a morpankh, and other ornaments — are not objects held sacred by the Hindu community within the meaning of Section 298. On mens rea, counsel pointed to the petitioner's own religion (she is Hindu), her issueless status, and the limited reach of a WhatsApp status — a private and restricted platform unlike Facebook or “X” — as factors negating any deliberate attempt to wound religious feelings.

The State counsel opposed the petition. He submitted that the FIR prima facie disclosed the offence, that Gaur had herself admitted making the dog wear the crown and posting the photo, and that belonging to the same community did not negate commission of the offence.

The Court’s Reasoning: Actus Reus

Justice Mehla began his analysis by examining what the word “object” means in Section 298 of the BNS. The judge cited three authorities on the equivalent provision, the erstwhile Section 295 of the IPC: Queen Empress v. Imam Ali (1887) 10 All 150 FB; Ramesh Chunder Sannyal v. Hiru Mondal 1890 17 Cal 852; and S. Veerabhadran Chettiar v. Ramaswami Naicker AIR 1958 SC 1032. Reading these authorities together, the court applied the ejusdem generis rule: the word “object” must be interpreted in the same genus as “place of worship.” Unless the object is located in a place of worship or carried in a procession on a festive occasion, Section 298 does not apply.

On these facts, the items placed on the dog — yellow cloth, crown, morpankh, ornaments — were not in a place of worship, nor were they being carried in a procession. They therefore did not constitute an “object” within the section. The actus reus was not established.

The Court’s Reasoning: Mens Rea and the Community Standard

On mens rea, Justice Mehla held that an act cannot constitute an offence under Section 298 solely because the sentiments of a particular individual or a handful of persons are hurt. The correct standard is whether the act would outrage or wound the religious feelings of an ordinary, reasonable member of the concerned community.

To establish this standard, the court drew an analogy with how obscenity is assessed. The older “Hicklin Test” from English law measured impact on the weakest or most impressionable mind. The Supreme Court replaced this in Aveek Sarkar v. State of West Bengal 2014 INSC 75, adopting the “Community Standard Test”: obscenity must be judged from the point of view of an average person applying contemporary community standards. Justice Mehla applied the same logic here — criminal liability for outraging religious sentiments cannot be founded on subjective hypersensitivity or idiosyncratic perceptions; it must be founded on the objective standard of the ordinary prudent member of the community.

The court then relied on the two Supreme Court precedents placed before it. In Mr. Kailash v. State of Maharashtra 2025(2) AIR BomR (Cri) 154, the court had held that unless deliberate and malicious intent to insult religious sentiments is demonstrated, Section 295A of the IPC is not attracted, and that the test is whether the act has the potential to disturb public order or morality. In Mahendra Singh Dhoni v. Yerraguntla Shyamsundar 2017 INSC 1282, a complaint arising from a magazine cover depicting Dhoni in the attire of Lord Krishna was quashed; the Supreme Court held that “insults to religion offered unwittingly or carelessly or without any deliberate or malicious intention to outrage the religious feelings of that class do not come within the Section.” The court also noted Priya Prakash Varrier v. State of Telangana (2019) 12 SCC 432, in which the Supreme Court reiterated that criminal proceedings should not be entertained where a person's intent is not to provoke or cause disorder.

Hindu Scriptural and Philosophical Analysis

Justice Mehla went further than the strictly legal analysis to examine the philosophical foundations of the complaint itself. The court described the FIR as reflecting a “parochially narrow understanding of religious philosophy” and proceeded to examine the place of the dog within Hindu tradition.

The court cited Chapter 5, Shloka 18 of the Bhagavad Gita, in which Lord Krishna himself is attributed the teaching that a wise person sees equal divinity in a learned brahmin, a cow, an elephant, a dog, and an outcaste. The judge reasoned that if Krishna taught that the same Divine Soul (Atman) resides in both a priest and a dog, then “seeing Krishna in a dog is not sacrilege — it is a realization of divine truth.”

The court also referenced the Mahaprasthanika Parva of the Mahabharata, in which Yudhishthira refuses to abandon a stray dog at the gates of heaven, only for the dog to reveal itself as Lord Dharma. The judgment noted the iconographic association of the dog with Kal Bhairava (a manifestation of Lord Shiva) and with Lord Dattatreya, traditionally depicted surrounded by four dogs said to represent the four Vedas.

Moving from texts to philosophy, the court cited the principle Sarvam Khalvidam Brahma from the Chandogya Upanishad (everything is at its core Brahman), Shankaracharya's Advaita Vedanta (all animate and inanimate things are part of the same fold of existence), and the Bhakti tradition of dressing one's child as Baby Krishna on Janmashtami. In this Bhakti framework, the petitioner — treating her dog as her child — was expressing devotion. The court also cited Saint Kabir's concept of a formless God residing in every atom of creation. Across these traditions, the court found unity on the primacy of bhava (emotion or devotional intent) over the intrinsic form of the object of devotion.

The court additionally referenced Hindu iconographic traditions including the animal-origin avatars of Lord Vishnu (Matsya, Kuruma, Varaha, Narasimha) as evidence that Hindu philosophy does not discriminate between human and animal form when it comes to the presence of the divine spirit. Comparative references to Egyptian, Japanese Shinto, Aztec, and Mayan traditions were made in passing to illustrate the broader cross-cultural pattern of attributing divinity to animals, though the court's doctrinal conclusions rested on the Hindu sources and the legal precedents.

Constitutional Dimensions

Justice Mehla grounded the outcome in two constitutional provisions. Article 19(1)(a) of the Constitution of India guarantees the right to freedom of expression, which the court held extends to symbolic expression such as dressing a pet — subject to restrictions of public order and morality, neither of which were found to be engaged on these facts. Article 25, which guarantees freedom of conscience and religion, the court held independently protects the petitioner's act as one of devotion or bhakti.

The court concluded that individual expression shaped by personal experience cannot be criminalised merely because it does not align with the sensitivities of others. In the absence of mens rea, criminal proceedings cannot be initiated to validate subjective perceptions of hurt. In the court's words, “constitutional tolerance must override hypersensitivity which leads innocent acts to be construed as desecration.”

Order

By order dated 1 July 2026, Justice Subhas Mehla allowed the petition. FIR No. 67 dated 3 September 2024 registered under Section 298 of the BNS at Police Station Talwara, District Hoshiarpur, together with the final report dated 19 January 2025 and all consequential proceedings arising therefrom, stand quashed. Pending miscellaneous applications, if any, were also disposed of. The judgment is marked as speaking and reasoned, and reportable.