A resident of the Malbazar area of West Bengal’s Jalpaiguri district was ‘detained’ by police for an “objectionable post” on social media against a Trinamool Congress leader.
Rohit Pashi (34), who was taken to the police station on Friday evening, claimed that he was kept in the lock-up for nearly 24 hours before being released on a personal bond at a local court.
Even as the TMC leader and local councillor Pulin Goldar said that he lodged a complaint with the Malbazar police against Mr. Pashi for making “derogatory comments” against him, the district police claimed that Mr. Pashi was “never arrested.”
“The reports of him [Pashi] being arrested for his post on social media are absolutely false. Police rescued him on Friday evening when he got involved in a scuffle with three or four persons,” Superintendent of Police, Jalpaiguri Akash Magharia told The Hindu.
Mr. Pashi, along with three or four others, was asked to “keep peace” and submit a bond under Section 107 of the IPC (instigating someone), the police said.Contradicting the police’s claim Mr. Pashi said: “I was arrested in front of my house at around 6.30 p.m. on Friday and was produced before a local court today [Saturday] afternoon.” In his said post, the youth had alleged the TMC leader was accompanying parents of an accused in a murder case. “They never paid a visit to the house of the deceased and are now running around in the Jalpaguri Court premises trying to save the accused,” the post read.
Refuting the latter’s claim, the TMC leader said: “I went to court to take bail in an old case against me and met the parents of the accused by chance.”
