Mumbai: Police in Maharashtra have booked unidentified persons after NCP (Sharadchandra Pawar) MLA Rohit Pawar demonstrated ‘voter fraud’ by procuring an Aadhaar card in the name of US President Donald Trump. The Maharashtra Cyber Police registered an FIR after Pawar demonstrated how one could create a fake Aadhaar card with the help of a particular website, and then use it to register bogus voters.
The FIR was lodged on a complaint by BJP’s social media cell co-convenor Dhananjay Wagaskar who named the creator, owner and operator of the website.
The case was registered under relevant sections of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita for forgery, identity theft and circulating false information, among other charges, besides provisions of the Information Technology Act, 2000.
According to an official statement by the police, the complainant accused Rohit Pawar of committing fraud which could “endanger social security and incite anger and hatred among the public against BJP and an autonomous institution in India”. Speaking to reporters, Pawar who is also grand nephew of NCP founder Sharad Pawar, called the FIR “laughable”.
“The sections of the law applied to the FIR include forgery. Where have I forged anything? I have shown how a theft can happen…I don’t know if they are having a stomach ache because I used Donald Trump’s name,” he said. The MLA from Karjat-Jamkhed constituency also questioned the other sections of the BNS invoked in the FIR.
Sharad Pawar-led NCP (SP) is a constituent of the INDIA bloc which has in recent months mounted a campaign accusing the ruling BJP of ‘vote chori’ (theft). The campaign was led from the front by Lok Sabha Leader of the Opposition Rahul Gandhi, who held multiple press conferences alleging widespread voter fraud in various constituencies.
(Edited by Amrtansh Arora)
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