JOIN USDelhi Police receives complaint against Swara Bhaskar, Twitter India MD in Ghaziabad assault case
A complaint has been filed against actor Swara Bhaskar, Twitter India Managing Director Manish Maheshwari and others with the Delhi Police in connection with posts on the micro-blogging site regarding the attack on Abdul Samad Saifi, an elderly Muslim man, earlier this month.
Officials said the complaint has been filed with the Tilak Marg police station. So far, no FIR has been registered though officials said the matter was under enquiry.
The filing of the complaint comes close on the heels of Uttar Pradesh Police registering a case against Twitter, news portal The Wire, journalists and Congress leaders, accusing them of sharing the video of Saifi with an intention to provoke communal unrest.
It was claimed that Saifi was thrashed by some youth and asked to chant 'Jai Shri Ram' but local police claimed that the accused, who were arrested, were unhappy about an amulet he sold to them and there was no communal angle.
Ghaziabad Senior Superintendent of Police Amit Pathak had said the victim had not made any allegation of being forced to chant Jai Shri Ram or the chopping up of his beard in his FIR lodged on June 7.
Journalists' organisations like Editors Guild of India, Press Club of India and the Indian Women Press Corps (IWPC) condemned the UP Police action of naming The Wire and journalists in the FIR.
Disapproving the "wanton misuse of laws to criminalise reporting and dissent to harass independent media", the Editors Guild demanded that the FIRs be withdrawn.
In its statement, the Press Club of India condemned the police action and asked the UP government to intervene in the matter to ensure that journalists are not made "easy targets" of "police high-handedness".
The IWPC said it stands in solidarity with "all journalists who are being victimised needlessly".
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