Motiur Rahman, a member of All India Majlis-e-Ittehad-ul-Muslimeen (AIMIM) was booked under the IT act for posting objectionable comments against West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on social media. He was arrested on Thursday by the West Bengal Police.
Rahman who is a senior professor at Dhangara Loliabari had posted on social media that the West Bengal police weren't functioning properly, instead were serving the Chief Minister as her party cadre. He had also posted his recording on Facebook wherein he is seen speaking with the local police.
Rahman, the resident of Chandrapara Grampanchyat of Chanchal in Malda district had also posted memes and displeasing words against Banerjee and the Bengal administration.
Earlier in May, Priyanka Sharma, the convenor of the Bharatiya Janata Party’s youth wing in Howrah, was arrested for sharing a meme of West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee.
In the meme she shared, Banerjee’s face was superimposed on actor Priyanka Chopra’s body, in the dress she wore to the 2019 Met gala.
Sharma had been charged under Section 500 of the IPC (defamation), and Sections 66A (offensive messages) and the non-bailable 67A (punishment for publishing or transmitting of material containing sexually explicit act, etc., in electronic form) of the Information Technology Act.
In 2012, a chemistry professor at Jadavpur University, Ambikesh Mahapatra, was also arrested for sharing an email with a caricature of Mamata Banerjee. He was later acquitted.
