In an earlier case, Postcard.news founder Mahesh Hegde went scot-free

BENGALURU: In November last year, the Postcard.news website had carried a slanderous headline about freedom fighters Kittur Rani Chennamma and Onake Obavva. The post showed these two women freedom fighters in poor light. In this connection, a woman had filed a complaint with the Sanjayanagar police against the owner of the website, the writer, and those who had shared the article on social media. 

The police had then registered a case under section 295A (deliberate and malicious acts, intended to outrage religious feelings of any class by insulting its religion or religious beliefs) of the IPC. However, no arrests were made then.

READ HERE | Postcard.news website owner Mahesh Hegde arrested on charge of  promoting fake news, religious enmity

This time, after Gaffar Baig, a resident of Whitefield, approached the Cyber Crime police and filed a complaint on March 21 over the alleged fake news about a Muslim youth attacking a Jain Muni and blaming the Congress-led state government, saying “…No one is safe in Siddaramaiah’s Karnataka”, the Central Crime Branch (CCB) took up the case and traced the accused Hegde based on the IP address and arrested him on Thursday.

MP SIMHA CRITICISES CONGRESS GOVT
Following Hegde’s arrest, BJP MP Pratap Simha criticised the Congress government for arresting him under the irrelevant sections of the Information Technology Act. Soon after the news of the arrest spread, BJP MP Pratap Simha tweeted, “Today morning Coward Congress Govt (Karnataka) arrested @mvmeet Mahesh Vikram Hegde under unconnected IT act 66, that too by using CCB! Shame on you @INCKarnataka.”