Delhi Police has arrested a 45-year-old butcher Shabbir Gurfan Pinjari from Surat for sending an obscene picture to journalist Barkha Dutt in February. Pinjari is sent to 14-day judicial custody. Three others, 23-year-old Rajiv Sharma, 31-year-old Hemraj Kumar and 34-year-old Aditya Kumar have also been arrested for sending obscene text messages. The three are residents of Delhi.
The four accused said they got Barkha’s number on social networking site where it was being circulated claiming it was for ‘escort services’.
On February 18, Barkha on the receiving end of sexual harassment when she got an unsolicited d*ck pic on her WhatsApp from an unknown number. She took to Twitter to voice her complaint where she had blamed ‘nationalists’ for sending her the offensive picture.
Following her tweet with the image, Twitter had blocked some of the features for her account, post which Barkha had complained to Twitter CEO, Jack Dorsey, though Jack did not respond. She had also claimed that she got many such obscene messages, which she did not put up in public domain.
An FIR was reportedly registered under IPC sections 354-D (stalking), 506 (threatening), 507 (criminal intimidation) and 120-B (criminal conspiracy), and sections 67 and 67-A (publishing or transmitting of material containing sexually explicit act) of the IT Act.