KOZHIKODE: Kannur resident Ladeeda Farzana, a student activist at Jamia Millia Islamia, has lodged a complaint with the Kannur district police chief against online sexual harassment by displaying her photographs along with many other Muslim women in ‘Sulli Deals’ app to falsely imply that the women were ‘up for auction’.
Ladeeda, who was active during the anti-Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) protests, said that though the app was removed after Delhi Police filed an FIR earlier this month, the online attacks against her and other women were continuing as the screenshots of the app containing their photographs were still being posted online in platforms like Twitter. Sulli is a derogatory term used to refer to Muslim women.
The complaint said that the creators of ‘Sulli Deals’ were still continuing their online harassment of around 100 women Twitter users who are active in various spheres. The Twitter accounts connected with ‘Sulli Deals’ are active and engaged in promoting the website and targeting selected IDs, it said.
The complaint cites a message posted by a Twitter user on July 4 stating that ‘I am the guy who created ‘Sulli Deals’ app. I used paid VPN and protonmail. You guys won’t be able to track me so stop crying in front of GitHub. It will go up soon, just wait and watch’. The hosting platform GitHub had removed the app after the illegal activity was revealed.
She said in the complaint that the act of the accused was dangerous and against the Constitutional principles. “By selectively targeting and attacking Muslim women, the accused also tried to foment communal divide,” the complaint said.
Kannur police authorities said that the complaint has been forwarded to Cyber Police wing for further action.
