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NEW DELHI - India's top court Thursday conditionally released Varun Gandhi, one of the heirs to the Nehru-Gandhi political dynasty, who had been jailed for inciting religious hatred during election campaigning.
The Supreme Court ordered his release just hours after voting began in the first phase of month-long general elections, in which Gandhi is standing as a candidate for the opposition Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
Gandhi, 29, was released on condition that he refrain from making any inflammatory speeches similar to the one he gave last month at a rally when he allegedly vowed the BJP would "cut the heads of Muslims".
The rally was filmed and the footage aired on India television, after which Gandhi was taken into custody.
The court ordered his release "on condition that ... he will not make such speeches likely to cause communal disturbance and hatred among any caste and community."
A great-grandson of India's first premier Jawaharlal Nehru, Varun Gandhi has broken with the "first family" of Indian politics by joining the BJP, rather than the secular-minded Congress Party which the Nehru-Gandhi lineage has dominated since independence.
His release means Gandhi will be allowed to resume campaigning for his own seat in the central state of Uttar Pradesh which will go to the polls in the last round of voting on May 13.
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