Kerala police register case against ex-Kotak Mahindra employee for hate speech on Kathua victim
Ernakulam resident Vishnu Nandakumar thought that he would get away with posting an outrageous and insensitive comment about the 8-year-old Kathua rape and murder victim.
He couldn't have been more wrong. While Vishnu, a former Kotak Mahindra Bank employee, took down his Facebook account after he faced backlash for his comment, he has not escaped the consequences of his actions.
The Kerala police on Saturday registered a case against Vishnu under Section 153 (a) of the IPC, for promoting disharmony or feelings of enmity between different religious groups.
This, after he participated in a discussion on the killing of the 8-year-old girl in Kathua of Jammu and Kashmir, saying:
"Good that she was killed at this age itself. Otherwise she would have grown up and come back as a suicide bomber against India."
Panangad police in Ernakulam have booked Vishnu, based on four complaints that they received. The police told TNM that they are in search of Vishnu, who is the son of RSS leader EN Nandakumar, who is a close relative of the BJP state general secretary, AN Radhakrishnan.
"We haven't been able to take him into custody yet, since he is not at home. We are looking for him," the Panangad police said.
Vishnu's post
While several users called him out for his hate speech, Vishnu's account was soon taken down. However, users had by then saved screenshots of his profile and this was circulated on Facebook groups. Facebook users, angered at Vishnu's insensitive comment, then wrote on Kotak Mahindra Bank's Facebook page, asking them to terminate Vishnu.
Forced by the umpteen number of comments, Kotak Mahindra soon released a statement claiming that they had already sacked Vishnu on April 11 for poor performance.
They also added: "It is extremely disheartening to see such comments being made in the aftermath of such tragedy by anyone including an ex-employee. We strongly condemn this statement."