NEW DELHI: The CBI has registered two cases relating to alleged circulation of “fake pornographic video” against Chhattisgarh Minister Rajesh Munat and related extortion bids from a person reportedly associated with him by an unknown caller.
Munat is a complainant in one of the cases relating to violation of the relevant Section of the Information Technology Act, 2000 (publication and transmission of materials containing sexually explicit act in electronic form). In his complaint, Munat had alleged that State Congress President Bhupesh Baghel and social media incharge of the State Congress and senior journalist Vinod Verma were circulating fake pornographic video in the social media with an intention to tarnish his image and derive political mileage.
The Chhattisgarh police had in October arrested Verma from his residence in Ghaziabad and claimed to have recovered about 500 CDs and pen drives.
“The Central Bureau of Investigation has registered two cases related to alleged possession & circulation of a fake pornographic video on the request of Chhattisgarh Government and further notification from Government of India and taken over the investigation of both the cases which were earlier registered by Chhattisgarh Police,” the CBI said in a statement.
The first case was registered under Section 384 (extortion) and 506 (criminal intimidation) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) at Police Station Pandri, Raipur on October 26 against unknown persons on the allegations that the complainant (Prakash Bajaj) received a call on his phone wherein the unknown caller said that he possessed a pornographic video of his “Aaka” (mentor) and threatened to distribute CDs of the same in case his demand of ransom was not met.
The other case was registered under Section 67 (A) of the Information Technology Act at Police Station Civil Lines, Raipur on October 27 against Baghel and Verma on the allegations that the said accused persons and others had circulated complainant’s (Munat’s) fake pornographic video on various social media platforms and distributed its CD to malign his character and to obtain political mileage.
The CBI re-registered both the cases on Tuesday and took over probe into them.