The above Criminal Original Petition is filed to call for records pertaining to FIR in Crime No.206 of 2017 on the file of the first respondent police and to quash the same.

2. The petitioners in the Criminal Original Petition are accused 1 to 19, 21 to 27, 29 to 31, 33 to 49 as per the complaint.

3. The brief facts that are necessary for the purpose of disposing of this petition are as follows :

3.1. All the petitioners are working in BSNL Department and the second respondent / de-facto complainant is also in BSNL Department as Divisional Engineer (Rural). It is stated that the petitioners as well as the second respondent are all members of an official whatsapp group.

3.2. It is admitted that the official whatsapp group was intended to be used by the members for sharing of any innovative works / ideas for improving the quality of service of BSNL.

3.3. It is admitted that the second respondent has posted the video footage of three customers who have spoken about their grievance about the BSNL coverage. It appears that the petitioners are mainly indoor staff of BSNL whereas the second respondent is an officer engaged as an outdoor staff. Since the conversation uploaded by the second respondent was taken as an act to degrade the indoor staff, the petitioners and few others have posted an emoji, namely, a smiling face with tears. Some of the petitioners felt that the conversation uploaded by the second respondent is likely to de-motivate the executives and is likely to tarnish the image of BSNL, they requested the members of SNEA by sending similar emojis in the whatsapp group to be shared by other members of the group. Following this, the petitioners who are the accused in the complaint have posted the same emoji, a cartoon face with joy but tears in the eyes. Annoyed by this, the second respondent gave a complaint.

3.4. In the complaint, the second respondent has stated that her husband is a practicing Advocate in Tuticorin District for more than 25 years and that she has two children. She further described herself as a Divisional Engineer (Rural) in BSNL. She states in her complaint that she was also inducted as a member of whatsapp group which was intended to share the complaints and deficiencies in the service of BSNL and to rectify them and improve the quality of service. The second respondent further stated in her complaint that as per the instructions of her superiors only, the recorded video of three of BSNL customers in relation to BSNL coverages was uploaded by her in the said whatsapp group. The allegations in the complaint is that the recorded conversation of BSNL customers uploaded by her is wrongly understood by the petitioners as one to degrade their efficiency and that they started retaliating the complainant and did this with an intention to humiliate her by posting the annoying emojis one after another. It is further stated that the accused 1 and 2 and other petitioners have conspired together and posted the smiley faces with tears through whatsapp against the second respondent. Since the meaning of the emoji is laughing till you cry, the second respondent described the posting of crying smiley faces in the whatsapp group as a most annoying thing intended to humiliate the second respondent. In the complaint, she further referred to the further messages sent by some of the petitioners requesting all members to send the same smiley face. It is further stated in the complaint that because of the posting of crying smiley faces against the second respondent, she was put to mental agony and hence, she could not sleep and she was crying all the night on 31.07.2016. In the complaint, the petitioners 1 and 2 were shown as persons who have induced other members to post crying smiley faces with an intention to humiliate the second respondent. The details of posting of such emojis by other petitioners was given in the complaint. A case was registered for offences punishable under Section 4 of Tamil Nadu Prohibition of Har