NewsClick founder ‘conspired to peddle narrative that Kashmir, Arunachal disputed’: Police

One of the charges against NewsClick founder Prabir Purkayastha is that he conspired to “peddle a narrative” that “Kashmir and Arunachal Pradesh are disputed territories”, according to the remand application filed by Delhi Police.

Purkayastha and HR head Amit Chakravarty were arrested on Tuesday by the Special Cell of the Delhi Police in a case filed under the anti-terror law following allegations that the portal received money for pro-China propaganda.

In the remand application, the police wrote, “Secret inputs revealed that Purkayastha, Neville Roy Singham, and some other Chinese employees of Singham-owned Shanghai-based company have exchanged mails which expose their intent to show Kashmir and Arunachal Pradesh as not part of India.”

The application added that these attempts “reveal their conspiracy to peddle a narrative, both globally and domestically, that Kashmir and Arunachal Pradesh are disputed territories. Their attempts to tinker with the northern borders of India and to show Kashmir and Arunachal Pradesh as not parts of India in maps amount to an act intended towards undermining the unity and territorial integrity of India”.

It stated that Gautam Navlakha, a shareholder in NewsClick, allegedly remained involved in anti-Indian and unlawful activities such as actively supporting banned Naxal organisations and having anti-national nexus with Gulam Nabi Fai, an agent of Pakistan’s ISI.

Host of accusations

According to the police’s application, foreign funds were siphoned off by Purkayastha and his associates.

“The accused persons have also conspired to disrupt supplies and services essential to the life of community in India and abet damage and destruction of property by protraction of farmers’ protest through such illegal foreign funding,” the application states. A false narrative was propagated to discredit the efforts of the Indian government to contain the COVID-19 pandemic, the police added in its application.

It went to add that Purkayastha allegedly conspired with a group — People’s Alliance for Democracy and Secularism — to sabotage the electoral process during the 2019 general elections. People’s Dispatch Portal, owned and maintained by NewsClick, has allegedly been used for intentionally peddling these false narratives through paid news in lieu of crores of rupees of illegally routed foreign funds as part of a conspiracy, the police application claimed.

It added that an analysis of emails shows that Singham, Purkayastha, and Chakraborty were in direct contact with each other and were found to be discussing how to create a map of India without Kashmir and to show Arunachal Pradesh as a disputed area.

To achieve the objective, the accused persons, in the guise of foreign funds, received more than Rs 115 crore, according to the application.

A raid was conducted on Tuesday at 88 locations in Delhi and seven in other states on the suspects named in the FIR and surfaced in the analysis of data, the police said.

The police applied for 15 days’ police remand for both the accused and got their custody for seven days.

The police sealed NewsClick’s office in Delhi, officials said, adding that 46 suspects were questioned and digital devices, including laptops and mobile phones, and documents taken away for examination.

(With agency inputs)