A city police team will be heading for Pune to interrogate four Bangalore-based software engineers who were arrested for posting an obscene profile of Shivaji clad in Orkut.
MUMBAI: A city police team will be heading for Pune on Saturday to interrogate four Bangalore-based software engineers who were arrested for posting an obscene profile of Shivaji clad in feminine innerwear on Orkut, the controversial social networking site.
The four techies — Laxman Kailas, Manjunath Betegowda, Harish Shetty and Kiran Shetty — were arrested in Bangalore on October 3 and brought to Pune. They were produced before a court which sent them to police custody till October 14.
The Mumbai team heading for Pune, which will be headed by deputy commissioner of police (DCP) Sanjay Mohite, will also be examining the possibility that the foursome may have been involved in posting derogatory remarks about Shiv Sena supremo Bal Thackeray.
Talking to DNA, Netaji Shinde of Pune police’s crime branch said that the investigation team first traced Laxman Kailas from “IP (internet protocol) addresses and emails.”
After Kailas' arrest and interrogation, he provided clues about the other three. "We managed to arrest them as well." According to Shinde, the Mumbai police have been called to question the four because they are suspected to be involved in uploading defamatory remarks about Thackeray.
The matter is also being investigated by the Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT) which comes under the Union information technology ministry.
The obscene representations were first reported in January 2007, and the matter was raised by opposition leader Ramdas Kadam in the budget session of the state legislative assembly. While replying to the debate, deputy chief minister and home minister RR Patil had assured that his department would investigate the matter and book the culprits at the earliest.
DNA has learnt that the matter was being investigated by cyber crime cells in various commissionerates in the state, but it was Pune that cracked the case. Sunil Phulari, DCP, economic offences wing and head of the cyber crime cell, played a key role in identifying the suspects and bringing them to book.
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