News portal 'The Wire' has filed a police complaint against one of its former consultant in connection with a "fabricated" story related to the BJP's IT department head Amit Malviya, a senior police officer said on Sunday.
According to the officer, the news portal filed the complaint late on Saturday through e-mail.
Earlier on Saturday, the Delhi Police had filed an FIR against the newsportal and its editors based on a complaint by Malviya, who accused it of "cheating and forgery" and "tarnishing" his reputation.
Malviya's FIR against The Wire
Malviya's complaint was filed with Delhi Police's special commissioner (crime) against The Wire, its founding editors Siddharth Varadarajan, Sidharth Bhatia and M K Venu, deputy editor and executive news producer Jahnavi Sen, the Foundation for Independent Journalism and other unknown people.
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The complaint was filed for various offences punishable under sections 420 (cheating), 468 and 469 (forgery), 471 (fraud), 500 (defamation) r/w 120B (criminal conspiracy) and 34 (criminal act) of the Indian Penal Code.
"I am filing the present complaint for the offences of cheating, forgery for the purpose of harming the reputation, using as genuine a forged document or electronic record and defamation amongst other provisions of the IPC by the accused," read Malviya's complaint.
"A case has been filed. Investigation will be initiated and necessary action will be taken," the officer said.
Story 'vitiated the atmosphere'
Malviya had on Friday said he will pursue criminal and civil proceedings against the portal over stories, since retracted, which insinuated that he enjoyed a special privilege on Meta platforms through which he could get any story taken down if he believed it was against the BJP's interests.
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Though 'The Wire' has apologised to its readers and withdrawn the stories as questions, including from experts, mounted over their veracity, the BJP leader had noted that it has refrained from apologising to him despite "maligning and tarnishing my reputation and causing serious harm to my professional career".
"My role requires me to vociferously advocate the BJP's point of view on national issues across platforms. This role is based on trust and camaraderie between me and my interlocutors across platforms and more importantly with the public," he had said in a statement on Friday.
"However, The Wire's stories have vitiated the atmosphere and severely dented relationships and trust built over years in order for me to carry out the functions of my responsibility," he said.
The Wire's response
The Wire, in a statement on Thursday, said journalists rely on sources for stories and do their best to verify material they receive.
"Technological evidence is more complicated and the usual due diligence may not always reveal the fraud perpetrated upon a publication. This is what happened to us," it said.
The Editors Guild of India had on Friday also criticised the portal's handling of the stories. It said it was "disturbed" by the recent turn of events with respect to reports published by The Wire on Meta and urged newsrooms to "resist the temptation of moving fast on sensitive stories"
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The story
Malviya had said The Wire's reports alleged the Meta (the parent company of Facebook and Instagram) regularly colludes with members of the BJP in removing content deemed unfavourable to the party.
Even after Meta issued a categorical denial and said the documents shown by the portal were "fabricated" and that the 'Xcheck' status, the privilege reportedly bestowed on him, had been mischaracterised, The Wire instead of pausing its coverage and doing an internal audit went on to publish yet another "malicious" report, he had said.
(With inputs from PTI)
