NOIDA: The family of the 15-year-old girl whose alleged abusive remarks against Prime Minister Narendra Modi during a protest at Delhi's Jantar Mantar went viral was not present at their Noida residence on Tuesday, while local police said they had received no complaint that the family was being harassed.
Security guards and the maintenance staff at the group's housing society in Sector 168 told PTI that the girl and her mother, who lived there, were not at home.
"The family had remained withdrawn since the video surfaced, and personnel from the Delhi and Noida police had visited the residence on a few occasions," a security guard told PTI.
The security and maintenance staff, however, said they did not know the family's current whereabouts.
Responding to the family's allegation of harassment, an official at Noida's Expressway police station told PTI that no information had been received within its jurisdiction about the family facing harassment either inside the housing society or elsewhere.
The official said Noida Police had registered a Zero FIR on the day it received the complaint and transferred it to Delhi Police, as the alleged incident took place in the national capital.
"The family has not been in contact with us since then and has not shared any information or complaint with the local police," the officer said, adding that the family may have shifted temporarily to Faridabad in neighbouring Haryana.
The development comes days after the girl's mother appealed to Prime Minister Modi to forgive her daughter, saying the family had repeatedly apologised and that the minor had been influenced during the protest.
In an interaction with PTI Videos on August 1, the mother said she was grateful to the prime minister for publicly forgiving the girl after the incident.
She urged Modi to consider restricting access to social media platforms such as Instagram and Facebook for children aged between 10 and 20 years, saying "minors should be kept away from protests and political activities as they can be easily influenced."
The mother also claimed that police personnel had repeatedly visited their residence after the video went viral despite the family apologising.
She appealed to the prime minister to intervene, alleging that the FIR incorrectly mentioned her daughter's age.
She said the girl was 15 and requested that the case be withdrawn so that she could "live peacefully".
The family's lawyer, Anil Kumar, also told PTI Videos that the girl is a juvenile and claimed the complaint wrongly described her as a 25-year-old woman working in a salon.
"The FIR had been registered without a proper preliminary verification and had that been done, the FIR would not have been registered at all," he added.
The controversy erupted after a video purportedly showing the girl using abusive language against the prime minister during a Cockroach Janta Party protest at Jantar Mantar went viral recently.
The youth-led protest was held against paper leaks and irregularities in the education system, demanding resignation of former Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan, who later stepped down.
The girl later released an apology video on social media, saying she had been "influenced", was "extremely embarrassed and ashamed", and that it was her "first and last mistake".
Prime Minister Modi subsequently said he had forgiven the students who allegedly abused him and his late mother, adding that they should be guided in the right direction rather than punished.
A Zero FIR was registered by Noida Police under relevant provisions of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita and transferred to Delhi Police as the alleged offence took place in the national capital.
Police sources in Delhi said on Monday that the Zero FIR was still under examination and had not yet been converted into a regular FIR.
They also clarified that no separate FIR had been registered in Delhi in the matter so far.