A defamation case was registered on Friday against All India Bakchod (AIB), a comic group founded by Tanmay Bhat, for allegedly “insulting” Prime Minister Narendra Modi in a tweet. On Thursday, the group tweeted a picture of a Modi look-alike peering into his mobile phone at a railway station alongside an actual photograph of the PM, with a dog’s nose, ears, and tongue superimposed on the image with a Snapchat filter. The post’s hashtag wanderlust apparently mocked Modi’s foreign visits.
Not all Twitter users were impressed, and the AIB came under fire from the PM’s supporters. Within hours, the group deleted the post fearing further backlash and then was trolled for being “scared” of the BJP.
According to agencies, a Twitter user drew the attention of the Mumbai police towards the AIB’s tweet and demanded action. The police forwarded the complaint to the cyber police station at Bandra-Kurla Complex, which registered a FIR under Section 500 (defamation) of the Indian Penal Code and Section 67 of the IT Act (punishment for publishing or transmitting obscene material in electronic form).
Sanjay Saxena, the joint commissioner of police, confirmed the development. However, despite several attempts, the police refused to disclose the name of the complainant. They also did not give the names of those accused in the FIR.
In 2015, the AIB had landed in trouble over a “roast” program featuring some Bollywood celebrities.
