The Gujarat Crime Branch on Tuesday arrested Mumbai-based filmmaker Avinash Das in a case related to sharing two separate photos of Union Home Minister Amit Shah with arrested Jharkhand cadre IAS officer Pooja Singhal and another of a woman painted with the national flag – on his social media account.
Das has been booked under Section 469 (forgery) of the Indian Penal Code along with the provisions of the Prevention of Insults to National Honour Act and the Information Technology Act. The forgery section is applied for sharing Shah’s photo with IAS officer Singhal, who is presently under arrest in a disproportionate assets case that is being investigated by the Enforcement Directorate.
The Gujarat police has accused Das of sharing the image to “mislead people and defame” Shah’s reputation. Das had posted the photo of Union Home Minister Amit Shah with arrested Jharkhand cadre IAS officer Pooja Singhal in 2017 and wrote, “Kuch din pehle.” The phrase literally translates to “a few days ago”, but can also be used figuratively.
Another photo, shared on Instagram, is of a woman with the national flag painted on her body. Of the three sections applied, only one is non-bailable. “We will move the lower court for bail immediately,” Das’s lawyer from Ahmedabad, Suhel Tirmizi, said.
The Gujarat high court had recently rejected his pre-arrest bail, following which he had moved to the Supreme Court. “The petition was to come up for a hearing on Friday, July 22,” Tirmizi confirmed. “But now with the arrest, that application is infructuous,” Tirmizi added.
Before moving an application before the Gujarat high court, Das had approached the Bombay high court. Citing jurisdiction, the court had directed Das to go to the appropriate court in Gujarat. Advocate Adil Khatri, who had handled his application in Mumbai, said that Das had agreed to hand over his mobile phone and was cooperating with the police. “He is a filmmaker and would not have absconded. His arrest was absolutely unnecessary,” Khatri said.
Das, director of the film Anarkali of Arrah, and TV shows like Raat Baaki Hai and She, was picked up from a few metres outside his house in Mumbai suburbs.
Giving details of the case registered by the Ahmedabad Crime Branch, the investigating officer said that the Ahmedabad Sessions Court had refused to grant anticipatory bail to Mumbai film director Avinash Das on June 7. Additional Sessions Judge Dilipkumar Thakkar, while refusing anticipatory bail, said uploading a picture draped in the tricolour showed Das’s “mental disorder” and he has insulted Indian culture and created hatred among the people by doing so.
