Kolkata: Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Amit Malviya told the The West Bengal Commission for Protection of Child Rights on Monday that he did not violate any law or Supreme Court guideline while posting a photograph of a minor girl after her unnatural death in Bengal’s South 24 Parganas district on June 16.
“It is respectfully submitted that the tweet does not disclose the identity of the victim in any manner. The image used in the tweet was deliberately and entirely blurred and no personal details such as the name, address, or particulars of the victim or her family were revealed,” Malviya, head of the BJP’s national information technology cell, said in his reply to the show cause notice the commission sent him on June 20 after taking suo motu cognizance of his June 19 post on X.
The commission said the minor could be easily identified despite an effort to digitally blur her face and saw this as a violation of the Juvenile Justice Act.
In his reply, which he shared on social media, Malviya wrote: “As such, the tweet does not violate any provisions of applicable law, including the POCSO Act, the Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Act, 2015, the guidelines issued by the National Commission for Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR). Additionally, the tweet is in complete consonance with the judgment of the Hon’ble Supreme Court in Nipun Saxena vs Union of India, (2019) 2 SCC 703, which emphasized safeguarding the identity and privacy of victims of sexual offences.”
In his June 9 post, Malviya alleged that the incident had a communal angle.
He wrote: “…Mamata Banerjee’s governance has been an unmitigated disaster for women’s safety. Worse still, the administration is suppressing the incident, citing “communal sensitivity” — because the victim is Hindu and the accused are Muslim. This is not secularism. This is state-sponsored injustice…”
The West Bengal police issued a rebuttal on X on June 20, calling Malviya’s allegation a lie and stating that post mortem examination had revealed that the minor died after consuming poison and there was no evidence of sexual assault whatsoever.
Malviya stuck to his allegation in his reply to the commission.
He wrote: “The intent of the tweet was to highlight the deteriorating law and order situation in the state of West Bengal and the increasing incidents of crimes against women….the tweet was made in good faith, in public interest, and in furtherance of constitutional freedoms, and not in violation of any legal provisions, as alleged.”
“It is also pertinent to mention that the National Commission for Women (NCW) has taken suo-moto cognizance of the incident, thereby recognizing the gravity of the offence referred to in the tweet,” he added.
No member of the commission made any statement on Malviya’s reply till Monday evening.
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