Delhi Police Monday raided the residences of The Wire co-founders Siddharth Varadarajan, MK Venu, and staffer Jahnavi Sen in connection with the FIR filed by Amit Malviya for the publication’s malicious reports against him.
And in no time, the left-liberal ecosystem came to their rescue, describing the raids as politically motivated against a publication known for its perennially and at times, unjustifiably critical reportage against the current dispensation. A concerted attempt to discredit the raids and paint them as vindictive action against the publication is underway on social media, where leftist ideologues are trying to project the searches as the Centre’s way of disciplining The Wire, Siddharth Varadarajan and other writers.
While the objective of the left ecosystem was to evoke sympathy for The Wire, Siddharth Varadarajan, and others and paint them as victims of state repression, they conveniently downplayed the offences for which the Delhi Police conducted the raids.
The reasons behind Delhi Police’s raids against Siddharth Varadarajan, MK Venu, Jahnavi Sen
The raids were not for defamation as per some leftist ‘intellectuals’ but for consistently indulging in forgery, cheating, fraud, fabrication, and criminal conspiracy. In fact, there is no civil defamation case against The Wire, Varadarajan, and others involved in the case. They face a criminal case for forgery, fabrication, and hatching a criminal conspiracy.
The left lobby’s protestations in support of Siddharth Varadarajan and company are ludicrous. Their assertion that Devesh Kumar misled them in their reportage on Meta stories is laughably absurd. Even if one were to presume that Siddharth Varadarajan and Jahnavi Sen were misled by Kumar for their original story, the subsequent forgery, fabrications and strident defence of their stance demonstrate the confidence and conviction of Varadarajan and other reporters in the original story and in allegations levelled by them.
In fact, even in face of contradictory evidence, and denial from independent experts, Varadarajan refused to budge and continued to place his faith in the Meta stories that have now been retracted by The Wire.
The Wire and Siddharth Varadarajan rubbished the statement issued by Meta that unequivocally denounced the allegations levelled by The Wire that Amit Malviya has powers that enables him to remove Instagram posts that are not to his liking. The story was passionately rebutted on social media too, where users pointed out the loopholes in The Wire’s reportage.
However, Varadarajan and the company dug their heels in and refused to heed the online criticism. They came up with a fabricated email by Meta executive Andy Stone to make a case for the authenticity of their story. Even after Stone termed the email as fabricated and alerted The Wire that the email might be fabricated, Varadarajan persisted with the claim that Malviya enjoys privilege on Meta’s Instagram app, having the capability of removing critical posts against the BJP.
If this was not enough, they verified fake Andy Stone’s email with fake DKIM, with forged verification of two external experts. It was only after independent researchers listed by The Wire as experts who verified the DKIM categorically refuted having done any such verification, did The Wire apologised and pulled down their Meta stories.
Besides all these inconsistencies, Varadarajan had also claimed the Wire internal computers had faulty data stamp due to TailOS. The question it raises is who accessed their computers to enable the forgery.
At one point during the course of the Meta vs The Wire saga, Siddharth Varadarajan also claimed to have met the Meta sources himself when social media users and domain experts raised questions about The Wire’s story.
Amit Malviya’s FIR against The Wire
The Wire retracted its Meta story after Amit Malviya moved to file a complaint against the publication. In his complaint addressed to the special commissioner of police (crime) Delhi, Amit Malviya said, “I am filing the present complaint against The Wire – an online news portal, Mr Siddharth Varadarajan Founding Editor of The Wire, Mr Sidharth Bhatia Founding Editor of The Wire, Mr MK Venu Founding Editor of The Wire, Ms Jahnavi Sen -the Deputy Editor and Executive News Producer at The Wire, Foundation for Independent Journalism the company that owns and publishes The Wire and other unknown persons. I am filing the present complaint for the offences of cheating, forgery for the purpose of cheating, forgery for the purpose of harming the reputation, using as genuine a forged document or electronic record, and defamation amongst other provisions of IPC.”
Amit Malviya added, “I say that this is not the first time that the Accused has published fake news. Recently, the Accused published a story on Tek Fog about a ‘superhuman app’ used by the BJP for SM interception. The said story was used by various national and international media to downgrade India and the thriving democracy of our country. However, subsequently, the Tek Fog story was taken down but The Wire as it was found to be false and fabricated, just as in the present case.”
