After an FIR was lodged against Kannada daily Vishwavani's editor-in-chief Vishweshwar Bhat accusing him of filing a derogatory article against JD-S candidate Nikhil Kumaraswamy, the Karnataka Union of Working Journalists (KUWJ) on Tuesday wrote a letter to HD Kumaraswamy censuring the FIR.
KUWJ president Shivanand Tagadooru wrote that the police complaint filed against Vishweshwar Bhat is not right and condemnable. He said that if there was any factually incorrect news, the complainant can demand the facts to be corrected as is the right procedure.
The act of filing the police complaint, Shivanand suggested, had "undertones of hatred". "By filing a police complaint against him and making news out of it seems to have undertones of hatred. In the past, whenever we have brought to your notice issues regarding various publications, you have responded promptly, you acted like a friend to the media," the letter adds, reports The News Minute.
The Bengaluru City Police had lodged an FIR against Bhat after a complaint was filed by JD-S general secretary Pradeep Kumar SP. The article titled "Nikhil Kumaraswamy Raatri Rampata" (Nikhil Kumaraswamy's night scuffle) was published in Vishwavani on May 25.
According to reports, Nikhil Kumaraswamy created a scene at the Radisson Blu Hotel in Mysuru after the election results were announced on May 23. He lost the Lok Sabha elections to independent candidate Sumalatha Ambareesh.
The report states that a drunk and angry Nikhil shouted at party supremo Devegowda, holding him responsible for his embarrassing defeat in Mandya against Sumalatha, who became the first independent woman candidate to be elected to the Lok Sabha from Karnataka.
"It is a shame for me that I have lost to a woman. The people of Mandya did not stand by me and my dream of being an MP did not come true," Nikhil shouted at his grandfather, states the Vishwavani report.
However, the complaint filed against Bhat by the JD-S resisted from the article saying that it was solely meant for defaming Nikhil Kumaraswamy and HD Devegowda. The complaint claimed that no such incident took place and it was all fictitious and made up.
The Srirampura police registered an FIR against Bhat under sections 499, 500, 501 (defamation), 504 (intentional insult), 506 (criminal intimidation), 420 (cheating), 406 (criminal breach of trust), and 468 (forgery) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC).
