A Facebook account that has been sharing pictures of minor girls – especially child actors – accompanied by inappropriate and criminal sexual comments, is under the scanner of the Kerala police. The police believe that the account is operated from Kerala, and are now acting on the basis of complaints filed by at least two child actors.
Since 2016, the Facebook account has been consistently sharing photographs of girl child actors in the Malayalam film industry. The photos are accompanied by sexual innuendos and “polls”, asking others to pick the child they want to rape.
Most of the photos are from the official pages of the child actors. The account also shares morphed photographs of Malayalam women actors.
On March 29, two of the child actors who were targeted by the account filed complaints with Childline – one in Malappuram and the other in Kottayam.
In Malappuram, the child’s statement was recorded and an FIR has been registered under section 67B(b) of the IT Act (creating and distributing sexually explicit material about children) and section 120 of the Kerala Police Act (creating nuisance through repeated calls or emails.)
In Kottayam, a case has been registered under section 509 of IPC (word, gesture or act intended to insult the modesty of a woman), section 13 (c) and 14 of POCSO (using children for pornographic purposes, and the punishment for the same), and section 67B(b) of the IT Act.
Malappuram Childline coordinator Anwar told TNM, "The child actor and her parents approached Childline to complain about this page that was consistently sharing images of her and three other child actors. They even hold offensive polls using the children's images. The comments on most of the photographs of these children are sexually explicit and outright illegal.”
"In all, the account has photographs of four child actors. Only two have filed a written complaint as of now, but we can take a suo motu case in the other two instances too," he added.
According to him, there are two more Facebook accounts by the same name and both continue to share sexually abusive content about children.
TNM went through one of the accounts, and found that it has more than 4000 users on the friends' list. Anwar pointed out that a majority of the profiles that are on the friends' list are fake and consistently share posts put up by the main account.