NAGPUR, Maharashtra: At least two FIRs (First Information Report) have been filed against the Republic TV head Arnab Goswami for his alleged derogatory remarks against Congress president Sonia Gandhi and for deliberate inflammatory statements.
The first FIR was registered in Sadar police station in Nagpur city of Maharashtra on the complaint of Maharashtra’s energy minister and senior Congress leader Nitin Raut. The second FIR against Goswami was registered in Chhattisgarh’s capital city Raipur on the complaint of state health minister T.S.Singh Deo.
One more FIR was registered in Bhilwara district of Rajasthan, however, no details were available as to who filed it.
Goswami is facing flak for his controversial comments regarding the Congress president which he made during a program on Palghar lynching case on Rebuplic TV.
The Nagpur police have booked Goswami under section 153, 153-A, 153-B, 295A, 298, 500, 504, 505(2), 506, 120-B and 117 of the Indian Penal Code.
T.S.Singh Deo tweeted that he had filed a complaint against Goswami in Raipur for deliberately making inflammatory statements on his channel to invoke hatred among different communities and using derogatory language against Congress President Sonia Gandhi.
The Congress party’s youth wing the Youth Congress has already launched a drive to file police complaints against Goswami in all districts of Maharashtra.
“By Thursday afternoon, police complaints will be filed in all 35 districts of Maharashtra,” claimed Manas Pagar, the general secretary of Maharashtra Youth Congress.
Meanwhile, Goswami has alleged that he and his wife were attacked by “some Congress-sponsored goons” on Wednesday night in Mumbai.
A report on the Republic TV’s website claimed that the attack took place at Ganpatrao Kadam Marg, just a short distance away from Goswami’s house, as he and his wife - Republic TV Editor Samyabrata Ray Goswami - were driving back in their Toyota Corolla.
“At around 12.15 am, I was driving back from my studio in Bombay dying complex in lower Parel in my car Toyota Corolla with my wife. About 500 meters from the residence, my car was overtaken by two people on a bike... One of the two people started pointing specifically at me… then they tried to hit my car with something and break the windowpane of my car… I realized that this was some kind of attack so I tried to move my car to the left. Then they started taking out bottles and they were furiously throwing liquids at my car. They made another attempt to break the windowpane of the car. I pressed my foot on the accelerator and moved away,” Goswami said in a video message.
He claimed that these two people were accosted by his security guards.
“My security persons (later on) told me that they (attackers) were Youth Congress workers who had said that they had been sent to attack me by their higher-ups,” the controversial journalist said in his video message and blamed Sonia Gandhi for this alleged attack.
The Republic TV’s official tweeter handle tweeted that Goswami and his wife went to the NM Joshi Marg police station to file a police complaint after the alleged attack but Mumbai police refused to name the alleged Youth Congress attackers in the FIR.