Mumbai: DN Nagar Police arrested a 21-year-old man for molesting a 12-year-old minor girl and posting her pictures on social media websites on Friday last week. The accused posted the pictures in anger after the family of the minor learnt about their child’s relationship with the man.
The accused was booked under relevant sections of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) for outraging the modesty of a woman and defamation, along with sections of the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) and Information Technology (IT) Act. He was produced before a court that remanded him to police custody for 10 days.
According to the police, the accused had befriended the minor who lives in his neighbourhood and had been in a romantic relationship with her for the last few months. When the minor's family got a whiff of this illicit relation, they asked her to sever all ties with Shaikh.
The girl then stopped entertaining Shaikh's calls and cut off all communication with him, which angered him. In a fit of anger, Shaikh shared a few pictures of him and the minor on social media.
"The girl's family then approached us and lodged a complaint last week, following which we registered a case against the accused. He had uploaded objectionable photographs of him and the girl on Instagram without her consent, which we recovered and deleted from the webspace," said Bharat Gaikwad, senior inspector of DN Nagar police station.
Shaikh, who is unemployed, is being interrogated by police and his phone is being checked to probe if he has any other objectionable content on his device.