Gujarat Police arrest filmmaker Avinash Das over tweets, to look for past 'objectionable' posts too

Gujarat Police has arrested filmmaker Avinash Das in a case related to sharing on Twitter a photo of Union Home Minister Amit Shah with arrested IAS officer Pooja SinghalThe Ahmedabad crime branch which arrested him from Mumbai was also looking into another tweet of his that appeared to hurt the sentiments of the Hindus and going through his older social media posts an official said As per the crime branch Das intentionally gave a misleading caption to Shahs photo in question Das director of the Swara Bhaskarstarrer Anaarkali of Aarah was picked up from his Mumbai residence by a crime branch team on TuesdayHe was produced before a magistrates court here on Wednesday afternoon The crime branch sought his custody for seven days but Metropolitan Magistrate M V Chauhan sent Das in its custody only till Thursday afternoon Das was officially arrested at 4 am on Wednesday We are now scanning his social media accounts to check if he had posted any other offensive material in the past said Deputy Commissioner of Police crime Chaitanya MandlikIn a release the crime branch said it has found another tweet posted by Das which appeared to be offensive and could hurt the sentiments of Hindus In this Hindi tweet posted on May 1 2016 cited in the Crime Branch release Das had stated in a satirical way that he cannot give up alcohol because gods reside in different types of liquor Das had directed the 2017 film Anaarkali of Aarah starring Swara Bhaskar Sanjay Mishra and Pankaj Tripathi and the 2021 movie Raat Baaki Hai He had also helmed Netflix series She The crime branch registered a First Information Report FIR against the filmmaker under section 469 forgery of the Indian Penal Code as well as provisions of the Prevention of Insults to National Honour Act and the Information Technology Act as he had allegedly also posted on his Instagram and Facebook accounts a photo of a woman draped in the national flagThe FIR against 46yearold Das was registered in June after he shared a photo showing IAS officer Singhal arrested by the Enforcement Directorate in a money laundering case saying something to Shah As per the FIR in the caption to the photo Das claimed the picture was taken a few days before Singhals arrest while it was actually from 2017 The misleading caption was given to tarnish Shahs image the crime branch claimed The sessions court here in June had rejected Dass plea for anticipatory or prearrest bail observing that he had deliberately claimed that Shahs photo with Singhal had been taken a few days before the latters arrest with the intention to iquesttarnish the image of the Home MinisterThe other photo of a woman draped in the national flag showed Dass iquestmental perversenessiquest the court had further said The Gujarat High Court had also rejected his anticipatory bail application observing that Das had violated the Prevention of Insults to the National Honour Act by circulating a painting showing a person wearing a dress made of the tricolour The Bombay High Court too had rejected Dass transit anticipatory bail applicationThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever