The Karnataka Police on Saturday arrested a man from Goa for making false claims about the Congress’s manifesto for the Lok Sabha election, The Indian Express reported.

Hours after the arrest, Bharatiya Janata Party leaders accused the Karnataka government of abusing power and said that they would ensure that the man would get legal support.

The man, who runs the X account BhikuMhatre, had on April 22 alleged on the social media platform that the Congress wanted to take away wealth from Hindus and distribute it only among Muslims. The post has now been deleted.

The X account echoed claims made by several Bharatiya Janata Party leaders, including Prime Minister Narendra Modi, during the election campaign. The Congress’s manifesto, however, does not make any mention of redistributing wealth among any religious community.

A Congress worker named J Saravanan complained to the police’s cyber crime cell against the man who runs the account BhikuMhatre on April 29. The police then filed a case under Section 153A of the Indian Penal Code (promoting enmity between groups) and Section 66C of the Information Technology Act (punishment for identity theft), according to The Indian Express.

Soon after the arrest, the chief of the BJP’s youth wing Tejasvi Surya accused the Congress government in Karnataka of “blatant abuse of power”. He added: “We will fight this, both inside courts and outside.”

Amit Malviya, the chief of the BJP’s social media cell, said that the party was in touch with the accused man’s family and would ensure legal support to him. “Congress has unleashed anarchy and is intolerant of dissent,” he alleged. “But there won’t be another Emergency in this country, ever.”

The accused man alleged that the Congress wanted to intimidate him for speaking the truth. He said he was willing take full judicial recourse, even if it meant approaching the Supreme Court, and claimed that he did not write anything that “may be called as inflammatory or communal'“.


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