A case has been filed against filmmaker Avinash Das for allegedly sharing a photo of Union Home Minister Amit Shah with suspended Indian Administrative Service officer Pooja Singhal, the Gujarat Police said, PTI reported on Monday.
Singhal, the former mining department secretary in Jharkhand, was arrested by the Enforcement Directorate on May 12 in an alleged money laundering case, according to the Hindustan Times. The agency said that it seized over Rs 17 crore from the house of her chartered accountant Suman Kumar.
On May 8, Das had shared a photo on Twitter of Shah and Singhal speaking to each other at an event in Ranchi in 2017. The police alleged that the filmmaker shared the photo to defame the home minister and mislead citizens.
Das was also booked for allegedly insulting the national flag by posting a morphed photo of a woman wearing the tricolour on Facebook, The Indian Express reported. He reportedly posted the photo on March 17.
A first information report has been filed against the 46-year-old filmmaker under Indian Penal Code Section 469 (forgery) and Section 67 of the Information Technology Act (transmitting obscene material), HM Vyas, a police inspector with the Ahmedabad Police’s Detection of Crime Branch unit.
Das has also been booked under the Prevention of Insults to National Honour Act and the Information Technology Act for allegedly posting the morphed photo on Facebook.
In 2017, the filmmaker directed the Hindi film Anaarkali of Araah, which featured Swara Bhaskar, Sanjay Mishra and Pankaj Tripathi.
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