The Madurai City Police have arrested the BJP’s Tamil Nadu secretary, S.G. Suryah, for a social media post vilifying Madurai MP, Su. Venkatesan and a non-existent Communist Party of India (Marxist) councillor.
A team of the Cyber Crime police from Madurai arrested Mr. Suryah at his residence in Chennai on the night of Friday, June 16, 2023, under various sections of the Indian Penal Code and provisions of the Information Technology Act, on charges of wanton vilification of a particular group and intentional insults.
The police said that the action had been taken based on a complaint lodged by CPI (M) Madurai Urban District secretary, M. Ganesan.
In his complaint addressed to the Commissioner of Police, Madurai City, Mr. Ganesan said that Mr. Suryah had posted a false message on a social media platform on June 10. In the message, Mr. Suryah had said that Viswanathan, councillor of ward 12 of Madurai Pennadam Town panchayat had forced a cleanliness worker to clean water mixed with human faeces. The worker, belonging to the Scheduled Caste community, later died due to an allergy and the CPI (M) MP, Su. Venkatesan was maintaining a stoic silence on the issue, Mr. Suryah had claimed in his post.
Mr. Ganesan claimed that Madurai district did not have a Town panchayat named Pennadam, and there was no councillor named Viswanathan. Similarly, no such incident involving the death of a cleanliness worker had been reported. He complained that Mr. Suryah had created social tensions by spreading rumours with the intention of incite caste clash.
Based on the complaint, Mr. Suryah was booked under various sections of the IPC including 153 A (wanton vilification upon particular group), 504 of IPC (insulting someone intentionally to provoke), 505(1)(b) (induce any person to commit offence against State or public tranquility), 505 (1) (c) (inciting community of persons to commit any offence against any other community).
Mr. Suryah was brought to Madurai and produced before a judicial magistrate court.
