Uttar Pradesh cops thwart Chhattisgarh police’s arrest of TV news anchor but arrest him themselves

In a dramatic set of events, a television news anchor was apparently saved on Tuesday by the Uttar Pradesh police, who thwarted the Chhattisgarh police from arresting him, but ended up letting the Noida police arrest him.

The TV news anchor is one of the accused named in an FIR filed in Chhattisgarh for the alleged airing of a fake video of Congress president Rahul Gandhi.

According to police sources, the anchor tweeted asking for help from the UP police, after a team of policemen from Raipur, Chhattisgarh, came to his home in an Indirapuram housing complex in Ghaziabad district on Tuesday morning.

“The Chhattisgarh police are waiting outside my house to arrest me...they have not informed the local police...is it legal?” the anchor had asked in his tweets to UP chief minister Yogi Adityanath and Ghaziabad police chief.

While the Ghaziabad police responded they would take action on the tweets, the Chhattisgarh police, too, responded through a tweet that they were not bound by law to inform the local cops.

Sources said that a team of Ghaziabad police reached the anchor's house within minutes, and the cops from the two states had a heated exchange over jurisdiction.

According to sources, the Chhattisgarh police showed a warrant for the arrest, but the Ghaziabad police did not allow them to take the journalist.

While the Ghaziabad police and the police personnel from Raipur argued, a team of Noida police reached the spot and arrested the TV anchor saying a case had been registered against him.

The Noida police did not elaborate the charges against the anchor.

The Congress slammed the UP police for intervening in the matter and accused the state government of trying to protect the news anchor.

Cases were lodged against the anchor in Rajasthan and Chattisgarh—both Congress ruled states—for airing the doctored video that twisted Rahul Gandhi’s remarks.