NEW DELHI – First, the firebrand lawyer wrote a one-sentence tweet about the role of the Indian Supreme Court in eroding freedoms in the world’s largest democracy. Two days later, he tweeted a photo of the court judge as a Harley-Davidson property of a political ally of the country’s powerful prime minister.
On Monday, the man behind the tweets, Prashant Bhushan, one of the most prominent advocates of public interest, will have a face for a choice: apologize for the tweets, which the court found offensive, or go to jail.
The possibility that Mr Bhushan, one of India’s most famous lawyers, could be sent to prison for a few posts on social media has sent shock waves through India’s legal community, with activists calling the case a backlog for the democracy of India and the independence of its once known judiciary.
Mr Bhushan, 63, said he would be sentenced on Tuesday for the tweets, which the Supreme Court ruled this month was criminal contempt.
“I feel that democracy has been destroyed in the last six years,” Mr Bhushan said in an interview about the time Prime Minister Narendra Modi, a nationalist and populist, has been in office.
In an earlier statement, Mr Bhushan indicated that he would rather serve the maximum six-month work penalty than apologize. “It would be absurd and contemptuous of me to offer an apology to the tweets that express what was and remains my bona fide belief,” he said.
Mr Bhushan’s case has been put on trial by the court. Many lawyers say the Supreme Court’s independence has been gradually lost and too often reflective sides with the government.
Some lawyers took to the streets to protest Mr Bhushan’s conviction, and many others, along with activists for the people, opposition politicians and journalists, urged the court not to send him to jail.
“It’s shocking,” said Lalit Bhasin, president of the Bar Association of India, an umbrella organization representing thousands of lawyers. “You cast the voice of the whole legal profession.”
Mr. Bhushan made a career out of taking over the government, well before Mr Modi and his Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party came to power in 2014. Mr. Bhushan has filed several corruption scandals under previous governments, including those led by the opposition. Modi, the Indian National Congress.
But in recent years, he has become one of the Modi administration’s most vocal critics. Mr. Bhushan has filed public interest accusations accusing Mr Modi’s government of misconduct, and has often spoken out against a Supreme Court, which in its estimation too often clashes with the government.
The two remarks that Mr Bhushan placed in the suspect’s seat were written and posted on Twitter in June, where the lawyer has more than a million followers.
In one tweet, he accused Chief Justice Sharad Arvind Bobde of hypocrisy, by posting a photo of the judge posing on a $ 67,000 Harley-Davidson motorcycle without a face mask and surrounded by people. Chief Justice Bobde, Mr Bhushan said, fled health rules, although he had placed the court on lockdown “denying citizens their fundamental right to access justice.”
The court said in its response that even though physical hearings remain adjourned, it held 879 hearings in almost four months.
The motorcycle belonged to the son of a local leader of Mr.’s party. Modi in the city of Nagpur.
In the other tweet, Mr Bhushan wrote that the court played a role in “how democracy in India has been destroyed” during the tenure of Mr. Modi.
The Supreme Court was not amused, ruling earlier this month that the remarks were a “calculated attack on the entire foundation of the judiciary.”
Although the two tweets amounted to just 478 characters, the court issued a 108-page judgment that Mr Bhushan found in contempt of court.
In July, Twitter removed both of Mr Bhushan from view in India, but activists took screenshots of the messages and circulated them widely.
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Lawyers and advocates for digital rights said Twitter set a dangerous legal standard that could apply to similar future allegations of libel.
In a statement, Twitter said the company is committed to free expression in India and around the world.
But the court has also handed down to Mr Modi a series of recent political victories. In November, the court ruled in favor of Hindus in a decades-old dispute over a holy site in Ayodhya, fought by Muslims, and gave Mr Modi and his followers a victory in their attempt to restore secular democracy as a Hindu nation.
In a speech earlier this month, AP Shah, a former chief justice of the Supreme Court in Delhi, said the Supreme Court had “rejected his role as arbitrator” when it adjourned the case regarding lifting restrictions on the internet and movement in the disputed Jammu and Kashmir region, to a commission composed by government.
“India is going towards a form of elected autocracy,” Mr Shah said.
But not everyone in the legal community supports Mr. Bhushan.
The contempt for the trial began about a month after Mr Bhushan posted the tweets when the nationalist lawyer, Mahek Maheshwari, lodged a complaint, calling the remarks “unfair” and “actually wrong”.
Mr. Maheshwari said in an interview that “there should always be a line between freedom of expression and respect.”
Mr. Bhasin, the head of the Bar Association, said most of the country’s lawyers want the court to withdraw the verdict against Mr Bhushan.
“The sentence,” he said, “is irrelevant.”
Jeffrey Gettleman contributed reporting.
