‘Toolkit’ Case: Nikita Jacob Gets 3-Week Transit Anticipatory Bail

After Disha Ravi’s arrest in the toolkit controversy, non-bailable warrants were issued against Jacob and Muluk.

A Maharashtra Based Lawyer, Nikita Jacob practices at the Bombay High Court.

(Photo edited by Kamran Akhter/The Quint)

The Principal Bench of the Bombay High Court on Wednesday, 17 February, granted transit anticipatory bail for three weeks to activist Nikita Jacob accused in the ‘toolkit’ case. The court also asked Jacob to furnish a bond of Rs 25,000.

The relief was granted on a plea moved by Jacob on Monday.

Looking at the facts, the court observed that the alleged offence is being investigated by the Delhi Police and the FIR is registered in Delhi.

The court said it is “undisputed’ that she is a permanent resident of Mumbai and made herself available for interrogation.

The court said that the seizure of her laptop and mobile phone has already been conducted and that Jacob is seeking transit bail in order to go to Delhi for reliefs.

While the plea was being argued, the court recorded that Jacob had no religious, political and financial intention to incite violence in Delhi on 26 January and that her house was raided on 11 February.

The court pronounced the verdict after having a look at the order passed by the Aurangabad Bench of the court, wherein co-accused Shantanu Muluk was granted the same relief.

After the arrest of 21-year-old Disha Ravi on Sunday in the toolkit controversy, non-bailable warrants were issued against Jacob and Muluk in the matter.

Muluk, also an activist, was granted transit anticipatory bail for 10 days by the Aurangabad Bench of the Bombay High Court in connection with the case on Tuesday.

What Are the Allegations?

In a press briefing on Monday, the Delhi Police had said that Shantanu was the owner of the email account from which the toolkit was created.

“The initial examination of Nikita revealed that she and her associates, Shantanu and Disha, had created the ‘toolkit’ Google document. The email account created by Shantanu is the owner of this document and all others are its editors,” the police said.

The police further revealed that a Zoom meeting took place on 11 January, attended by Jacob and Shantanu and organised by the Poetic Justice Foundation – which the police deems as a ‘pro-Khalistani’ organisation, in which "the modalities of the Global Day of Action were worked out".

“Based on the course of action decided in the Zoom meeting, Nikita, Shantanu, Disha, and others collaborated together to draft the toolkit document. The document that they drafted had secessionist and pro-Khalistani content embedded into it through links and texts,” the police said in a statement.

These developments came amid politicking over the arrest of Ravi from Bengaluru on charges of “sharing and spreading” the ‘toolkit’ as apart of an alleged international conspiracy.

Ravi has denied being part of any conspiracy and said that she didn't create the toolkit and just made two edits to it.