Jaipur: Rajasthan police registered 224 FIRs between Jan 2022 and Dec 2025 in connection with alleged derogatory comments, posts, depictions and content targeting the Hindu religion, deities, religious texts and beliefs on social media, digital platforms and public forums, according to information tabled in the state assembly Tuesday.Replying to an unstarred question raised by Chhabra MLA Pratap Singh Singhvi, the home department said 75 such cases were registered in 2022, 44 in 2023, 55 in 2024 and 50 in 2025. The govt said all reported cases resulted in FIRs and there was no instance where a complaint was received but an FIR was not registered.Reacting to the figures Wednesday, Singhvi termed the trend “highly unfortunate” and blamed what he described as the legacy of Congress’ appeasement politics. “Insults to Hindu gods, goddesses and our religious practices are highly unfortunate. These incidents show how the Congress govt’s politics of appeasement continues to haunt Hindus even today,” Singhvi told TOI.The BJP MLA said he would raise the issue with Chief Minister Bhajan Lal Sharma and BJP state president Madan Rathore. “I will speak to the CM and the BJP state president to ensure that such cases come down to zero and Hindus are protected,” he said.The assembly reply further stated that police arrested 396 accused in these cases during the four-year period. District-wise details of arrests, chargesheets, pending court cases and bail granted to accused were attached to the reply.The govt acknowledged that law and order was affected on five occasions due to such incidents, but maintained that timely action was taken by police and district administrations.The assembly reply included cases registered under IPC provisions, Information Technology Act sections and, in recent years, provisions of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita. Several cases involved social media posts, videos, comments and other online content alleged to have hurt religious sentiments.On whether the state planned to introduce a separate standard operating procedure, dedicated cyber-monitoring mechanism or time-bound prosecution framework to deal with such cases, the state govt replied no fresh proposal was under consideration. It said existing police circulars and instructions issued by the Director General of Police in 1998, 2011 and 2019 regarding communal harmony, riot prevention and maintenance of law and order were already in force.The detailed annexures submitted to the assembly contain district-wise information on cases, accused persons, dates of incidents, police stations and the status of investigations and court proceedings.
