Odisha: CBI team gheraoed during raid in child pornography case

A five-member CBI team was gheraoed by angry locals for over an hour when it raided the house of a suspect in a child pornography case in Dhenkanal district of Odisha on Tuesday, police said.

Some women and lathi-wielding youths also prevented a police team to rescue the CBI officials when the law enforcers arrived at the spot upon receiving information.

The central probe agency team was led by CBI inspector, Delhi, Sandeep Kumar Tiwari, and comprised one officer from Kolkata and three others from Bhubaneswar.

The CBI officials reached the house of a suspect in the Jadupati Vihar area under the Dhenkanal Town police station area and interrogated him for long hours, police said.

As the interrogation continued for over six hours, the local people gheraoed the CBI team members and attempted to rescue the man, police said.

After getting information, personnel of the Dhenkanal Town police station reached the place and rescued the CBI team members after facing resistance from some women and young men.

“The CBI team had not given any prior information regarding the programme. However, we have rescued the five members. The suspect has been taken away by the investigating agency and he may be produced before the CBI court in Bhubaneswar on Wednesday,” Town Police Station inspector-in-charge Soubhagya Kumar Swain said.

A member of the CBI team said that the man was allegedly posting obscene pictures of children on pornographic sites.

The investigating agency has seized the man’s mobile phone and some other materials from his house. He is suspected to have been working as an agent for a pornographic website, the team member said.

Speaking to local reporters, the person said he had joined a WhatsApp group only two months back after coming across a link on the internet.

“I was only sharing the links of adult content from one website to other sites and groups. I had received 21 USD (Rs 2000 approximately),” he admitted. Meanwhile, raids were also conducted by CBI officials in the houses of two persons at Keutangua village in Jajpur on similar charges. Officials of the central investigating agency also searched a house in Binayakpur area of Bhadrak district.

The CBI on Tuesday started a coordinated search operation at 76 locations in 14 states against 83 people allegedly involved in sexual abuse of children and posting and circulating abuse material on the webspace, officials said.

The central agency has registered 23 separate cases on November 14 against 83 people allegedly involved in online child sexual abuse and exploitation, they said.

Apart from Odisha, searches are being conducted in Andhra Pradesh, Delhi, Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, Bihar, Tamil Nadu, Rajasthan, Maharashtra, Gujarat, Haryana, Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, and Himachal Pradesh, a CBI official said.

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