Rashtrapati Bhavan files complaint with Delhi Police against Lalit Modi

mangaloretoday.com

New Dehi, July 05: There could be fresh trouble for former IPL chief Lalit Modi since at least one of his tweets has now landed up as a “high-profile” complaint with Delhi Police.

Earlier this week, Rashtrapati Bhavan dispatched a formal complaint to Delhi Police, attaching with it a copy of a June 23 tweet put out by Modi which referred to the President’s Secretary, Omita Paul, in a derogatory manner.

 

Sources said the complaint, signed by a Rashtrapati Bhavan official, asked for “ appropriate action” to be taken by Delhi Police.

While Rashtrapati Bhavan officials said they would not like to comment on the subject, the President’s office had earlier issued a statement terming the contents of Lalit Modi’s June 23 tweet as “baseless, tendentious and malicious”.

Speaking to The Sunday Express, Delhi Police Commissioner B S Bassi confirmed the receipt of the complaint along with a copy of the offending material. Declining to go into details, he said, “We have received such a complaint a few days ago and it is presently under scrutiny. We are examining the options in the case and suitable action will be taken shortly.”

While it was not clear if the June 23 tweet was the only subject matter of the complaint, other senior Delhi Police officers said that with the Supreme Court striking down Section 66A of the Information Technology Act, other provisions may have to be applied.

“What we have to decide is whether to handle the complaint from Rashtrapati Bhavan as a criminal complaint or not. We also have to examine whether the offensive tweet constitutes criminal defamation,” a police officer said.

Earlier, it was revealed that in his testimony to UK authorities on his residency matter, Lalit Modi had alleged that Pranab Mukherjee, as Finance Minister, had turned the Enforcement Directorate on him since his revelations on Sunanda Pushkar’s Kochi IPL stake had resulted in Shashi Tharoor stepping down as a minister of the UPA government.

The complaint lodged by Rashtrapati Bhavan comes at a time when the ED is expected to issue summons to Lalit Modi to join its probe.