The storm over screenshots that purport to show a private conversation between TMC MP Mahua Moitra and another person intensified when the West Bengal Police accused the Noida police of obstructing efforts to detain a man accused of circulating them.
Moitra has denied that the screenshots are of her chats, calling them “forged and fabricated”. On Thursday, she shared two videos on X, alleging that the BJP IT department in-charge, Amit Malviya, called the Noida police when police personnel from West Bengal had gone to arrest the accused in Noida. She also alleged that Noida police “helped the accused abscond”.
Police in UP’s Gautam Buddha Nagar district, under which Noida falls, said the man was not at his residence when they reached there.
The Cyber Crime Wing of the West Bengal Police, meanwhile, issued urgent takedown notices to X, demanding that the social media platform remove the content, which it described as “sexually explicit”, to protect the privacy of a people’s representative.
The Lok Sabha member from Krishnanagar filed a complaint dated February 7 at Kotwali police station in her constituency against the circulation of “fabricated” chat screenshots and their reposting on X. “The posts are derogatory, sexually harassing and aimed to slander and hurt my dignity as a woman. This is being done purposefully and with malicious intent,” read the complaint. She also mentioned five social media handles and requested action.
Based on the complaint, an FIR was registered under sections pertaining to sexual harassment, stalking, cyberstalking, counterfeiting, intentional insult with intent to provoke breach of peace, defamation, forgery for the purpose of harming reputation, and criminal conspiracy, as well as under the IT Act.
The Cyber Crime Wing had already issued a notice to X on February 6, under section 79(3)(b) of the IT Act, asking it to remove the content. It told X that handles on the platform were “sharing private, intimate and sexually explicit chat messages (including personal and private conversations) of a sitting MP of India… This act… constitutes a serious criminal offence under Indian law.”
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The controversy escalated on Thursday, when Moitra posted two videos on social media purportedly showing a man standing at the door of his flat and speaking to another person over the phone, while police personnel waited outside. In one of the videos, a policeman was seen receiving a call.
“West Bengal Police went to execute a warrant. See how the accused calls BJP troll army chief Amit Malviya, who threatens Noida police with, ‘Aap kuch nahi karenge (you will not do anything)’. Everything is caught on video, so Noida police should stop lying,” Moitra said.
On Wednesday, Malviya had said, “This morning, the West Bengal Police landed unannounced at the Noida residence of a journalist. The purpose was clear: to arrest him for allegedly sharing chats between a Trinamool Congress MP and her paramour… That they could not arrest him is another matter altogether. But a fundamental question arises — who decides whether these chats are fake or genuine? Certainly not the Krishnanagar police.”
Meanwhile, Krishnanagar police accused their counterparts in Noida of preventing them from discharging their duties. According to police in Noida, they had set out to assist the West Bengal Police team that arrived to serve a warrant on Tuesday. “The station in charge of Sector 110 immediately responded, and the team raided the flat in question. The warrantee was not found at the scene,” the officials said.
(With inputs from ENS, Delhi)
