Bengaluru [India], May 19 (ANI): The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has extended legal support to an X user identified as Bhiku Mhatre following his arrest by Karnataka police for allegedly posting an edited video of Chief Minister Siddaramaiah.
While assuring legal support to Mhatre, BJP leader Amit Malviya hit out at the Congress government in the state, accusing the latter of being "intolerant of dissent."
In a post on X, Amit Malviya said on Saturday, "Karnataka Police have arrested
@MumbaichaDon from Goa. We are in touch with his family and will ensure he gets all legal support. Congress has unleashed anarchy and is intolerant of dissent. But there won't be another #Emergency in this country, ever."
The Cyber Crime unit of Karnataka police filed an FIR against Bhiku Mhatre (@MumbaichaDon on X) on April 29 under Section 66 (C) of the Information Technology Act, 2000 penalising fraudulently or dishonestly making use of electronic signature, password or any other unique identification feature of any other person, and 153A of the IPC, penalising attacks upon religion, race, place of birth, residence, language, etc of any particular group or class.
As per the Karnataka police FIR, Mhatre in his post shared an edited video of CM Siddaramaiah along with an objectionable short text over the Congress manifesto.
BJP state chief Tejasvi Surya also attacked the Congress government in the state, accusing it of "blatant abuse of power."
"This is blatant abuse of power by the Karnataka Congress government. We will fight this, both inside courts and outside," Tejasvi Surya said in a post on X on Saturday.
Union Minister Smriti Irani also came to Mhatre's defence while confirming his legal support in the case.
"Spoke to @Tejasvi_Surya re the case. Legal support has been assured," she said in a post on X on Saturday.
Mhatre has been booked based on a complaint lodged by J Saravanan, hailing from Sriramapura. In his complaint, Saravanan claimed that Mhatre posted an edited video of CM Siddaramaiah speaking about minority reservations along with objectionable comments.
This post is to create enmity and hatred among different communities and also to bring a bad name to the Congress party, the complainant said.
Earlier this week, Karnataka police filed an FIR against three persons for allegedly making objectionable posts against Deputy CM DK Shivakumar.
The police have booked Santosh Nelamangala, Kesari Samrat, and Rajesh Gowda on charges of sharing obscene materials on social media based on a complaint by Harish Nagaraju. (ANI)
