Woman arrested over Facebook posts on Maharashtra deputy CM Devendra Fadnavis's wife

MUMBAI: A 50-year-old woman was arrested by Maharashtra cyber police on Tuesday for allegedly making "abusive" and derogatory comments against deputy chief minister Devendra Fadnavis's wife Amruta Fadnavis on a fictitious Facebook account.

Maharashtra nodal cyber police arrested Smruti Panchal, a resident of Bhayander Pada in Thane, following a complaint by Pallavi Sapre, president of BJP Yuvti Morcha. Sapre alleged that while surfing Facebook, she came across the comments against Amruta Fadnavis by one 'Ganesh Kapoor'.
Based on the complaint, an FIR was registered against the unknown person under Indian Penal Code (IPC) sections for forgery, cheating, impersonation and intentional insult with the intent to provoke breach of peace, and a word, a gesture or an act intended to insult the modesty of a woman, and under sections of the Information Technology Act.
Panchal was produced before the metropolitan magistrate court and remanded to police custody. Police have seized her two mobile phones allegedly used to upload objectionable content.
During the course of technical investigation, the police traced the IP address of 'Ganesh Kapoor' to Panchal's residence at Bhayander Pada. They reportedly also learnt that the accused had created several other fictitious accounts on Facebook, on which too she had made objectionable remarks against Amruta Fadnavis. She had created a total of 53 Facebook accounts and 12 Gmail accounts, the police said. In November 2021, too, Panchal had posted remarks against Amruta Fadnavis on her own Facebook account. No case was filed then.