A 21-year-old man in Haridwar, Uttarakhand has been arrested for allegedly selling offensive images of Hindu goddesses online, the police said on Friday, a few days after the Delhi Commission for Women (DCW) had brought the issue to their notice.
Deputy Commissioner of Police (IFSO/Cyber Crime Unit) Hemant Tiwari said the accused, Adarsh Saini, a BBA graduate, wanted to implicate a business rival in a fake case and hatched a conspiracy to circulate the vulgar pictures under his name.
On October 29, the DCW issued a notice to the police after it received a complaint from a person called ‘Apurva Verma’ about the sale of the offensive images and an investigation was launched.
A senior officer said, “Initially, we found that the sender of the offensive content had identified himself as ‘Rahul Kumar’ and also shared his bank account details to receive money from the buyers of the content.”
The police traced the initial suspect to Bihar’s Darbhanga district and questioned him, but he told them that someone was trying to malign his image, Mr. Tiwari said.
With help from cyber experts, the police team discovered that the actual culprit had sent the offensive messages using fake email IDs, the DCP said. “We successfully traced Adarsh Saini and arrested him,” he added.
During interrogation, the accused told the police that he had recently completed his BBA from a private university in Dehradun and started a business related to online gaming.
“He had created a website and used to provide gaming IDs to customers. Rahul Kumar had created a similar website and it resulted in significant losses to Saini, who then decided to take revenge from Kumar.
“After circulating the offensive content online in Kumar’s name, the accused, using another fake name ‘Apurva Verma’, filed various complaints with law enforcement agencies along with the DCW to pursue legal action against Kumar,” the DCP said.
He added that a WiFi router has been recovered from the accused which was used for the criminal activities.