Manas Dasgupta
NEW DELHI, July 6: While the Congress filed a complaint with the News Broadcasting and Digital Standards Authority (NBDSA) on Wednesday against Zee News and its anchor Rohit Ranjan for airing a doctored video of Rahul Gandhi, the journalist approached the Supreme Court seeking protection even as the Chhattisgarh police twice knocked the doors of his Ghaziabad house with arrest warrants only to find it locked and the anchor “missing.”
The incident has also sparked off clashes between the Chhattisgarh and Uttar Pradesh police with the former accusing the latter of obstructing in their duty to execute a magistrate’s order to arrest the anchor while the UP police claimed that the Chhattisgarh police did not follow the “due process of Law” of approaching the local police before reaching the home of the accused to arrest him.
The Congress in its complaint accused Zee News and the anchor of deliberately distorting a video clip and “falsely and maliciously” depicting former Congress president Rahul Gandhi as a sympathiser of the killers of Udaipur tailor Kanhaiya Lal.
In a letter to the NBDSA chairperson, Congress spokesperson Pawan Khera said the mistake of distorting the clip has not been made by any other news agency, channel or newspaper except for Zee News.
“The impugned news broadcast by Zee News had sought to falsely and maliciously suggest that former INC (Indian National Congress) President Shri Rahul Gandhi demonstrated sympathy for the killers of Kanhaiya Lal by calling them “children,” Khera said.
The senior Congress leader clarified that the comments made by Rahul Gandhi were referring to the recent vandalism of the Congress party office in his Lok Sabha constituency Wayanad in Kerala and “were in no way connected with the horrifying murder of Kanhaiya Lal in Udaipur.”
“It was only after numerous complaints by the INC and the public at large, wherein the distortion and falsity of the broadcast were pointed out that impugned news broadcast was taken down,” the letter said. The letter further noted that the news channel has violated the provisions of the Cable Television Network Regulation Act, 1995, Cable Television Network Rules, 1994 and the Code of Ethics & Broadcasting Standards. The Congress has requested NBDSA for prompt action against the news channel and the anchor.
Zee News earlier apologised for the mistake and there were multiple FIRs in Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh filed against its anchor Rohit Ranjan. The video was also shared on social media platforms by BJP MPs Rajyavardhan Rathore, Subrat Pathak and others, for which FIRs have been filed against them as well.
Faced with multiple FIRs in different parts of the country, particularly the Congress-ruled Chhattisgarh and Rajasthan, Rohit Ranjan on Wednesday made an urgent mentioning in the Supreme Court seeking protection. “This is the case of a TV anchor. He made an error in one of his shows. He has apologised unconditionally… Issued a public apology, but is facing multiple FIRs. The Noida Police has questioned him and released him on bail. The Chhattisgarh police is seeking to arrest him… We seek an urgent listing,” senior advocate Siddharth Luthra submitted before a Vacation Bench of Justices Indira Banerjee and JK Maheshwari during an oral mentioning.
The court agreed to hear the case on Thursday, but took exception, minutes later, to the fact that the application had not yet been filed in the Supreme Court. The advocate-on-record said the application was in the process of being numbered by the registry.
Rohit Ranjan had already been subject to around 12 hours of questioning by the Gautam Buddha Nagar Police, who released him on bail. The Noida Police had whisked Ranjan away from his Ghaziabad residence on Tuesday morning, leaving the Chhattisgarh police stranded. The Raipur Police had a non-bailable warrant against Ranjan.
The Chhattisgarh police early on Wednesday visited his Ghaziabad residence with arrest warrant for the second time but found it locked. The anchor apparently has not returned to his residence after being released on bail by the Noida police on Tuesday.
The Chhattisgarh police accused the Noida police of obstructing their efforts to arrest him. On Wednesday, the Chhattisgarh police said Rohit Ranjan was absconding after their team sent to his residence in Ghaziabad could not find him there for the second time in two days.
Deputy police superintendent (Raipur), Udayan Behar said they were informed late on Tuesday night that the Uttar Pradesh police picked Ranjan for questioning and arrested him before he was released on bail. “Assuming that Ranjan will be back home after being released, we reached his residence at 8am on Wednesday. He was not there and his house was locked,” said Behar. He said they will visit Zee News office in Noida as part of their investigation.
Behar said though a complaint was filed with the Indirapuram station house officer regarding the events that unfolded at Ranjan’s residence on Tuesday, the Ghaziabad police had not issued a receipt of the complaint. “We were simply told that a receipt will not be issued to us. We will be visiting the Ghaziabad SSP’s office today regarding our complaint,” Behar said. The Chhattisgarh police will also visit the Zee News office to issue a notice to the officials concerned regarding their investigation, Behar added.
The Chhattisgarh police had reached Ranjan’s home Tuesday with a court warrant for arrest based on a complaint by Congress MLA from Bhillao, Devendra Yadav. It alleged that the channel “edited the clip and ran a false story” to “spread terrorism and break the nation’s unity.” At the same time, the UP Police too reached the spot and took Ranjan into custody for questioning in a related case registered in Noida against two colleagues by the channel.
In the complaint submitted to SHO Indirapuram Tuesday, Behar said his team reached Ranjan’s home at 6 am Tuesday “to carry out the process of arrest” when 10-12 Ghaziabad police officials arrived and asked his team to wait.
“We were asked to show our identity cards as well as the arrest warrant. When we asked Ranjan to follow the due process prescribed under a court-issued arrest warrant, SHO Indirapuram arrived at around 9 am and informed us that warrantee Ranjan was being taken to Indirapuram station and asked us to accompany as well. Thereafter, Ranjan was taken away in a car without us,” Behar has stated in the complaint.
A Ghaziabad police official, meanwhile, said the Chhattisgarh police did not follow the due process of law which required them to approach local cops before arriving at Ranjan’s residence. “There are principles laid down which have to be followed by all police officials before making an arrest. Chhattisgarh police did not approach the local police station which they were bound to do,” the official said.
According to Behar, in the facts and circumstances of this case, Chhattisgarh police were not required to approach local police under Section 79(3) (warrant directed to police officer for execution outside jurisdiction)of the Criminal Procedure Code. “Under Section 79(3) of the Criminal Procedure Code, if a police officer has a reason to believe that delay in obtaining endorsement from magistrate or local cops in whose jurisdiction the warrant is to be executed will prevent such execution, then police officer who has to execute the warrant can do so without such an endorsement in any place beyond the local jurisdiction of the court which issued it. Therefore we rushed to Ranjan’s residence as we did not want to delay the execution of the warrant,” Behar said.