NEW DELHI:Former IPL chief Lalit Modi has courted fresh trouble, with the Rashtrapati Bhavan lodging a complaint with the Delhi Police’s Economic Offences Wing for his alleged derogatory remarks against President Pranab Mukherjee and his Secretary Omita Paul on Twitter.
The police are yet to register an FIR in this regard.
The complaint was sent to Delhi Police chief B S Bassi from the President’s Secretariat, with the screenshots of June 23 and June 25 tweets of Lalit. Bassi then forwarded it to the Economic Offences Wing.
A final call on the complaint would be taken by Bassi, who is seeking legal opinion on whether the tweets amounted to criminal defamation.
As the Supreme Court recently scrapped Section 66A of the Information Technology Act relating to criminal defamation, the police are examining provisions that could be applied against Lalit. They are planning to approach a city court seeking a restraint order for Twitter to block the page. “We are still examining the complaint and seeking legal opinion,” a senior police officer said.
The officer added that they were examining whether the case could be registered under IPC Sections 499 and 500 for criminal defamation, as the tweets were aimed at bringing disrepute to the President and his office.
The former IPL chief had alleged that Pranab, during his stint as Finance Minister in the UPA Government, pushed the Enforcement Directorate to act against him as he raised questions about the shareholding pattern in the IPL Kochi franchise, which led to Shashi Tharoor’s resignation as Union Minister.