Complainant claims the Twitter celebrity, who has been booked for malicious content against the CM, his family and women politicians, had appeared before the VP Road police, but disappeared after spotting a Cyber Cell team
The accused, Sameet Thakkar
Twitter celebrity Sameet Thakkar, who has been booked for posting malicious content against Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray and his family members, had appeared before the VP Road police on October 5, on the direction of Bombay HC to cooperate with the investigators, but disappeared after allegedly noticing a Cyber Cell team.
Complainant Dharmendra Mishra told mid-day, "Thakkar is part of a hate brigade working with the IT cell of BJP and lives in Nagpur."
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Approached the Cyber Cell
"The FIR was registered on July 7 and a police team was sent to Nagpur in August to arrest Thakkar but he was not available at his home. Till date, he has not stopped spewing venom in his tweets against the Maharashtra chief minister and his family members and female politicians belonging to non-BJP parties and journalists. The police team camped in Nagpur for a month but returned empty handed," said Mishra. He claimed Thakkar has been followed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, former Maharashtra CM Devendra Fadnavis and dozens of Union cabinet ministers.
The car that Thakkar allegedly fled in
Since the investigation did not yield result, the complainant also approached the Cyber Cell of the Mumbai police.
Thakkar approached the Bombay HC to quash the FIR against him and Justices SS Shinde and MS Karnik, on October 1, directed him to appear before the VP Road police station and record his statement. Mishra claimed that Thakkar reached VP Road police station with his two advocates.
Sources told mid-day that a team of the Cyber Cell also reached VP Road police station to hand Thakker a notice under Section 41A (notice of appearance before police officer) of CrPC. But after learning that, Thakkar disappeared without recording his statement on the pretext of using a washroom.
'Got into a car and fled'
"Thakkar got into a car bearing the registration number MH 01 CT 5678 and the investigating officer PI Sopan Kakad and senior PI Gulabrao More did nothing to stop him. The car belongs to a BJP worker, Mangesh Dalvi, who lives in Lower Parel. This amounts to contempt of court as Thakkar did not record his statement. Most of Thakkar's tweets are highly defamatory, insinuative and amount to criminal intimidation, which may cause social unrest," claimed Mishra, who met Joint Commissioner of Police (Law and Order) Vishwas Nangre Patil regarding the matter.
Nangre Patil changed the investigating team and handed the case over to Assistant Commissioner of Police Rajeev Sawant. The matter of his disappearance was also raised in the HC where Abhinav Chandrachud, a senior counsel who appeared for Thakkar, told the bench that "he (Thakkar) had apprehensions that the Cyber Cell team may arrest him after handing him a notice."
The hearing on the plea to quash the FIR was scheduled for Monday. The HC has directed Thakkar to appear before the police station on Friday. The matter was adjourned to October 23 for hearing.
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