A criminal case was registered on Monday against three persons in Uttar Pradesh’s Hathras district on charges of allegedly posting a picture of Chief Minister on Facebook and promising a reward of ₹1 crore to anybody who would kill him.
The police have constituted two teams for their arrest, a spokesperson for the U.P. Director General of Police said. They were identified as Sushil Yadav, Sunil Kumar Yadav and Sayyad Rehman Ilyas.
The three were booked under Sections 295 (injuring or defiling place of worship, with intent to insult the religion of any class), 504 (intentional insult with intent to provoke breach of the peace) and 506 (criminal intimidation) of the Indian Penal Code.
The FIR, registered at the Kotwali police station in Hathras, also invokes Sections 66 (computer related offences) and 66d (cheating by personation by using computer resource) of the Information Technology Act.
Under Section 66 of the IT Act, a person can be punished with imprisonment for a term extending up to three years or with fine which may extend to ₹five lakh or with both.
The police took the action based on a complaint by Rajpal Singh Dishawar, an advocate. According to the complaint, Sushil Yadav posted a photo of Mr. Adityanath on social networking site Facebook on June 9. Another person, Sunil Kumar Yadav, allegedly commented on the post using objectionable language and set a reward of ₹1 crore for eliminating the CM, a police spokesperson said.
Sunil Kumar Yadav’s comment was “liked” by Sushil Yadav and Sayyad Rehman Ilyas, police said.
This is not the first such case in U.P. after the Yogi Adityanath-led BJP formed the government in the State. In March, the Greater Noida police arrested a 22-year-old youth for allegedly posting objectionable content against Mr. Adityanath.
The same month, a 25-year-old man from Ghazipur in east U.P. was arrested for uploading an allegedly objectionable picture of the CM. Then in April, a municipal councillor in Ghaziabad was arrested for allegedly posting a defaced photograph of the CM.
