Migrants' protest: Man held for offensive social media posts

Mumbai: The city police have arrested a man for posting messages on his social media accounts which allegedly led to a gathering of large number of migrant workers in suburban Bandra on Tuesday, April 14.

Vinay Dubey, a resident of neighboring Navi Mumbai, was arrested in the early hours of Wednesday after he was questioned over his posts on Facebook and other social media platforms, a police official said.

He had uploaded a video on social media in which he demanded that the Maharashtra government make travel arrangements for migrants, who are stranded due to the coronavirus-enforced lockdown and want to go back to their native places, he said.

He had also tweeted about the issue and called for a national-level protest if trains are not arranged till April 18 to ferry migrants workers to their native places, he said.

Dubey was initially detained by Navi Mumbai police and later handed over to the police in suburban Bandra.

He has been booked under IPC Sections 153 A (promoting disharmony, enmity or feelings of hatred between different groups), 117 (abetting commission of offence), 188 (disobedience of order by public servant), 269, 270 (negligent and malignant act likely to spread infection of disease danger to life) and provisions of the Epidemic Diseases Act, he said.

“His interrogation was underway at the Bandra police station,” the official said.

The police suspect his social media messages contributed to the protest by more than 1,000 migrant workers, most of them from Bihar, Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal, near Bandra railway station on Tuesday afternoon.

They were demanding that the state government make transport arrangements so that they can go back to their native towns and villages.