HYDERABAD: The Central Crime Station (CCS) of Hyderabad registered a case against NTV, T News and several other news channels as well as social media handles for allegedly telecasting and publishing fake news on a minister and an IAS officer.
The case was registered based on a complaint filed by Special Chief Secretary Jayesh Ranjan on behalf of the IAS officers association.
In his complaint, Jayesh Ranjan said that on January 8, NTV published and telecast a news item regarding a woman IAS officer that was “completely false, fabricated and baseless”.
The broadcast was malicious and unsubstantiated allegations were made against a serving woman IAS officer, insinuating an alleged personal relationship with a political executive and attempting to link her official postings to such baseless claims, the complaint said.
The cheap insinuations made regarding the officer’s postings, where it was falsely claimed that she was given “comfort postings” over a short period, which not only grossly misrepresented established administrative processes but also sought to deliberately undermine the credibility of the civil services and the constitutional framework within which postings and transfers are carried out, it added.
The complaint further said that though the said reports did not directly name the woman IAS officer but they made oblique references. It clearly points towards the woman IAS officer who served as Nalgonda collector, secretary to the government and presently posted as collector of a district.
The harassment did not end with the telecast. The content, including the cheap and unsubstantiated allegations, was deliberately made viral on multiple social media platforms, including YouTube channels of MR Media Telangana, Prime9 Telangana, PV NEWS, Signal TV Telugu, Volga Times, Mirror TV Official and T News Telugu as well as X handle of Telugu Scribe.
The actions of NTV, its management, editors, reporters and anchors and the associated social media handlers constitute a concerted attack on the dignity and outraging the modesty of the woman officer, it added.
Police registered the case under Sections 75, 78, 79, 351(1) and 352(2) of BNS and launched the investigation.