Man held in West Bengal for harassing TV anchor, her hubby

MUMBAI: A 46-year-old man was arrested for harassing a TV anchor and journalist by sending her obscene messages, and after learning that she got married, he started sending her husband and in-laws abusive and objectionable messages on social media.
Cuffe Parade police arrested Atanu Aichroy from Kalyani district, West Bengal, under IPC sections for outraging the modesty of a woman, intentional insult with intent to provoke breach of peace and criminal intimidation, and under Information Technology Act.
The victim had complained that the accused was sending obscene messages on Facebook. In her complaint, she stated she initially ignored them, but he then started sending abusive messages to her husband and mother-in-law too.
Police said she used to receive several messages from people, but when she received a personal message, she checked and found he was not on her list of friends, and hence immediately blocked him. Within few days, he opened another Facebook account and started sending messages, but she blocked him again.
“Later, he opened an account in the name of ‘Ershad Alam Khan’ and started sending objectionable messages. In 2016, she married and the messages stopped. But within two months her husband started receiving abusive messages from ‘Raka Alina’,” said a police officer.
Police said the accused filed a complaint with the social service branch that her husband had videographed some women in Pune. Her husband had to clarify with police that it was untrue. Police said he then started sending vulgar messages to her husband and mother-in-law, causing “mental torture”.
When he started threatening to harm her and her husband, the anchor got an FIR lodged with Cuffe Parade police. Based on the Internet Protocol address police trace him to West Bengal. Police said they had strong evidence, with screenshots and technical logs, which will ensure conviction.
Sunil Pandey, advocate for the accused, said, “It is a false allegation. To increase PR, the victim asked my client for help. In fact, they regularly chatted with each other for long.”
Police said they are looking out for another accused, who had opened a fictitious account and sent messages to her from Ludhiana.