New Delhi: Vinod Verma, who was arrested around 4 am on Friday from his home near Delhi by the Chhattisgarh police on charges of extortion, alleges that he is being targeted because he has a sex CD featuring a minister.
“I have a sex CD of a Chhattisgarh Minister, he is Rajesh Munat and that is why the Chhattisgarh government is not happy with me,” Verma, a member of the Editors Guild of India, told reporters while being taken to court after hours of questioning.
Verma was arrested at his Ghaziabad home by a police team that caught the last flight out of Raipur to investigate the sex CD and allegations of blackmail. The police claim they have seized hundreds of CDs, a laptop and a pen drive from Verma’s home. They say he “intended” to distribute objectionable CDs, refusing to disclose the contents to the media. The minister, however, has called the CD “fake” and said it can be investigated by any agency.
A freelance journalist, Verma has been Digital Editor at Amar Ujala and has also worked with the BBC Hindi service. He was part of a fact-finding team of the Editors Guild that travelled to Chhattisgarh last year to examine cases of intimidation of journalists.
His arrest followed a complaint on Thursday by Prakash Bajaj, a member of the Chhattisgarh BJP’s IT cell, that “someone had a CD of his boss (the minister)”.
Late on Thursday night, the police took a flight to Delhi and went to a shop that had allegedly made 1,000 copies of the sex tape. The shop owner allegedly named Verma as the man who had commissioned the copies.
The Chhattisgarh government claims Verma was working with the opposition Congress to discredit the BJP government. The journalist, it says, is related to state Congress chief Bhupesh Vaghel. Vaghel has denied it.
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