Bengaluru: There was a rash of arrests in the city on Sunday in connection with provocative messages posted on social media denigrating security forces, in the wake of terror attack in Kashmir on February 14.
Three Kashmiri students, two from a nursing college, in the city were arrested for their Facebook posts. The accused have been identified as Haris Manzoor, a second year student in Spurthy college of Nursing and Gowhar Mustaq, a third year student of the same college. The third accused has been identified as Zakir Maqbool, a BSc student from Chinai college.
Zakir was staying along Haris and Gowhar at the Spurthy college hostel campus in Anekal. The police said they were arrested based on a complaint filed by the college principal on Saturday.
According to the police, another student Koushik Debnath had in his Facebook post mourned the death of the CRPF personnel, which drew negative comments from the trio. They had reportedly abused Indian army personnel.
Later on Friday a scuffle broke out in the hostel mess and the Kashmiri students had beaten up Koushik and his friends. The incident was reported to the principal who filed a police complaint on Saturday.
A senior officer said that the three have admitted that they posted the comments to express their solidarity with Kashmir and Pakistan.
The police have booked them under various sections of Indian penal code for disrupting harmony, assault and unlawful activity. They were remanded to judicial custody.
Engg student held
In another incident a 22-year-old engineering student was arrested for his offending Facebook post. The accused has been identified as Thahir Shazad Latif, who hails from Baramulla and is a third year engineering student with Reva college in Yelahanka. In his Facebook post he had stated, “I salute the man who killed these soldiers,” along with images of a devil appreciating the killings of CRPF personnel in Pulwana, near Srinagar.
College dropout held
In another incident on Sunday, cyber crime police arrested a 20-year-old college dropout for posting provocative comments in a Facebook post. The accused has been identified as Faiz Rasheed, a resident of HBR Layout. The police said he was an engineering drop out and unemployed. After receiving several complaints by people about his Facebook posts, the police took up the case and traced him, based on the internet protocol (IP) address. Faiz was arrested from a bakery in Kammanahalli. Probe revealed that he had created a separate account only to put up provocative posts about the Pulwama terror attack.
Kashmiri booked
Earlier on Friday, HAL police had booked another Kashmiri Aabid Malik for sedition. He had reportedly posted messages supporting the Pulwana attack suicide bomber. However, the police found that he used to reside in Kumarswamy Layout, but left the city six months ago. The police are on vlookout for him.
