The Vadodara police arrested a 26-year-old man for an Instagram video in which he is seen threatening comedian Agrima Joshua with rape.
Youtuber Shubham Mishra was arrested on Sunday. He had uploaded the offensive video a few days ago on his Instagram account.
According to reports, the Cyber Crime Cell registered a suo motu case after coming across the accused’s video which was posted by actor Swara Bhasker on her Twitter handle, in order to highlight the incident and urge cops to take action.
Vadodara City Police took suo moto action in respect of an abusive, threatening video which was uploaded and shared on Social media by Shubham Mishra.
— Vadodara City Police (@Vadcitypolice) July 12, 2020
We have detained him and initiated legal process for registration of FIR against him under relevent section of IPC and IT act. pic.twitter.com/XM6J8y4nDx
An FIR has been been registered against him under Indian Penal Code sections 294 (Obscenity), 504 (Intentionally insults to break public peace) 505 (Statements conducing to public mischief), 506 (Criminal intimidation) and 509 (Intending to insult modesty of a woman), as well as section 67 of the Information Technology Act (Transmission of electronic material which is lascivious or tends to deprave or corrupt people).
Vadodara police will produce Shubham Mishra in court tomorrow after he undergoes the mandatory #Covid19 test during the day. Mishra has been lodged at the Vadodara Crime Branch lock up for the night @IndianExpress
— Aditi Raja (@aditijf) July 12, 2020
The offensive video was targeted at Agrima, for a clip of her performance in April 2019, where she talks about the upcoming statue of Chhatrapati Shivaji in Maharashtra and the funny rumours about the statue on Quora. Agrima has been subjected to rape threats and abuse for two days for the 2019 video. She has taken down the video and apologised as well.
The video has also prompted the National Women’s Commission (NCW) in New Delhi to write to the Gujarat Police, seeking action against the accused.
“The case is being investigated by the inspector of Cyber Crime police station,” said Jaydeepsinh Jadeja, DCP, Cyber Crime Cell of Vadodara Police.
The video was uploaded on Shubham Mishra’s instagram handle which has over 35,000 followers. It went viral. Comedians such as Kunal Kamra and several actors too shared it asking for immediate intervention in taking action against the accused.