Advocate Grover “All transactions proved. These are financial transactions”

 “All transactions are proved. These are financial transactions” said Advocate Grover during the hearing on Saturday.

While it appears that Mohammad Zubair was arrested because he shared a joke from this 1983 film shared from a Twitter handle, this handle mysteriously vanished after his arrest.

Shock From Many On His Arrest

Anger sparked across the nation from various bodies of people and organizations due to Zubair’s dubious arrest, while the right-wing reacts to the support of Zubair from many across the nation.  The fact is Zubair’s arrest signifies alarm bells for everyone.  This arrest signifies that without a crime, the police can pick up anyone and hold them in jail, and seize their laptops with no offense proven.  While millions languish waiting for true justice for heinous crimes, Zubair was arrested on suppositions from a fake handle that dissolved after his arrest.   There is the assumption that Zubair’s arrest was mainly done to get his laptop and even greater worries that something will be “planted” in his laptop to implicate him.  You see, Zubair is not an ordinary journalist.  He is a fact-checker, someone who sends shockwaves and jaw-droppers across the nation leading to uncomfortable wrigglings from the political arena.

Some popular works they uncovered were a fake right-wing website.  Alt News identified the individuals running the Hindu right-wing website DainikBharat.org. and Sinha revealed that a video purportedly of a Hindu man being lynched by Muslims in Bihar was in fact from Bangladesh.

He also exposed Delhi-based lawyer Prashant Patel who falsely compiled many fake news on his Twitter account. He also showed that a video allegedly depicting a Marwari girl married to a Muslim man being burnt to death for not wearing a burqah was from Guatemala, Central America, and falsely presented as an incident in India, allegedly done by the Hindu right-wing.

Video from Guatemalan, Not India.https://t.co/qIOyxKkJ0f

— Mohammed Zubair (@zoo_bear) December 16, 2018

According to the BBC, a report by Alt News in June 2017 demonstrating that the Indian Home Ministry had used a picture of the Spanish-Moroccan border to claim it had installed floodlights on India’s borders led to the ministry facing online mockery.

Sinha has compiled a list of more than 40 of what he describes as fake news sources, most of which he says support right-wing views.

The Alt News team has written a book titled “India Misinformed: The True Story” published by HarperCollins which was released in March 2019. The book has been “pre-endorsed” by Arundhati Roy.  In 2017, Sinha was invited to the Google NewsLab Asia-Pacific Summit to discuss potential solutions to fake news.

Verdict Given By Media Before Court’s Verdict

Was Zubair’s arrest plotted, scripted with the verdict from Media before Court’s verdict?  This is the worrying question people are asking.  Strangely, even before the Supreme Court said anything, the Delhi cops leaked out about foreign funds received by Zubair which some news channels started crying about in the evening, while the Court was to give their verdict on the case the next day.

It was unsettling to see for the first time in India, Court protocol overturned and disregarded and not respected.  In fact, Indians normally hold the Supreme Court’s verdict in the highest honor even if they disagree, but presently, even Justice Pardiwala of the Supreme Court who has a harsh voice on Nupur Sharma’s comments on national television is experiencing trolling and abuse from the right-wing Hindutva crowd.  Law and order appear to be dissolving in India and most bodies are only talking about it, not ensuring the resurrection of its power and purity.

During the hearing on Saturday:  Advocate Grover “All transactions are proved. These are financial transactions”

During the hearing on Alt News co-founder Mohammad Zubair’s bail plea on Saturday, the police told the court they have counted three serious sections against him in the FIR. They alleged that Zubair had received payments through Razorpay in violation of FCRA from Pakistan, Syria, UAE, Australia, Singapore, and Riyaadh.

“From the analysis of the reply received from the Razorpay Payment gateway on the account of Pravda Media, it has been revealed that there were various transactions using mobile numbers and IP addresses from foreign countries,” the prosecution claimed.

In fact, special public prosecutor Atul Srivastava said the investigation was underway and the police may again seek his custody.

Advocate Vrinda Grover, appearing for Zubair, claimed the donations were received by Pravda Media, the parent company of Alt News, and not by the accused. “Pravda is a section 8 company. I did not receive any such funds directly into my account…See if there is one financial transaction of a foreign company. Has anybody asked me about it? This power is not given to (police to) mislead the court… All transactions are proved. These are financial transactions. A company taking funds is not a violation of FCRA. You (police) have not issued notice to Pravda. You said the journalist took (funds) and then said Pravda. Facts have been muddled up. This is why we need a fact-checker in this country,” Grover argued.

The public prosecutor disputed her claim saying Zubair was the director of the company. The police had also claimed that Zubair had not produced the mobile phone with which he had tweeted back in 2018. In response, his counsel said the phone had been snatched by some bikers and the complaint made to the police in this regard had been put on record. However, the court said nothing was put on record to show that the earlier phone was lost.

On Zubair’s contention that the offenses were not made out since the tweet in question was the still image from a Hindi film, the court said this was of no assistance to the accused as sections under FCRA Act had been added. Zubair was produced before the court around 10.30 am on expiry of his police custody.

The police did not seek an extension of his remand and moved an application for Zubair to be sent to judicial custody for 14 days. His counsel then moved an application seeking bail. After hearing arguments till 1 pm, the court reserved the order.

The public prosecutor said that section 201 of IPC has been invoked as a call detail record (CDR) analysis has revealed that Zubair was using a Redmi Note 8 mobile phone before June 25. “He was served a notice to join the investigation (in another case) on June 24. He deliberately changed his mobile phone and deleted data from the previous one.

The phone he gave to the police was blank,” he said. To this, Grover said Zubair could do whatever he wanted with his phone since it was private property and asked if it was a crime to carry multiple mobile phones?

Grover alleged it was a “fishing and roving inquiry”. Speaking against the police’s seizure of Zubair’s laptop, Grover said the data’s integrity and sanctity have to be preserved but there is a worry that it can be manipulated. “No hash value has been created of his mobile phone till date. There is a real apprehension of tampering and manipulation which will take me to the new sections added against me,” she claimed.

“We are not living in a police state. If they can demonstrate that an offence is made out against me, I will give them my laptop. It cannot be that first you give me your laptop and then you will demonstrate the evidence,” she said. She also asserted that no religious feelings had been hurt by the tweet. “This Twitter handle (Hanuman Bhakt) pulls out this tweet for what purpose? He says his religious sentiments are hurt, but this is not ‘Indian Hurt Sentiment Code’. This is the Indian Penal Code,” she said, adding that the section of criminal conspiracy was not made out in the matter. “Who am I (Zubair) in conspiracy with? It cannot be that I am in conspiracy with myself. They have not arrested any other person in the matter,” the counsel said.

Alt News released a statement on Twitter:

Our statement regarding the recent allegations: pic.twitter.com/XwfpE7egcJ

— Alt News (@AltNews) July 4, 2022

Overwhelming Support for Zubair

The overflowing support for Zubair draws sharp criticism from the right-wing accusing the “liberals” of not fighting for Nupur Sharma, Ketaki Chitale, and others.  Not only heavy hashtags are streaming on Twitter demanding Zubair’s release but different bodies have written letters to the Court and government.

Truth! #MohammadZubair #zubairarrest pic.twitter.com/djfAwx3JMc

— Satish Acharya (@satishacharya) June 28, 2022

Thank you RaGa 🙏🏼 for raising voice in support of #zubair.#zubairarrest pic.twitter.com/TuBeUgZVEK

— India Against Hate (@UnitedWithINC) June 28, 2022

Faisal Mahmud a journalist in Bangladesh tweets, “We, a few journalists and human rights activists from Bangladesh formed a human chain today at a busy Dhaka intersection to demand the release of
@zoo_bear
. #IStandWithZubair #JournalismIsNotACrime

We, a few journalists and human rights activists from Bangladesh, formed a human chain today at a busy Dhaka intersection to demand the release of @zoo_bear. #IStandWithZubair #JournalismIsNotACrime pic.twitter.com/mHmm9hHilW

— Faisal Mahmud (@FaisalM08083126) July 2, 2022

All these exposures have probably led to a crusade to weaken Mohammad Zubair.  In fact, recently,  Zubair was nominated by Norway’s PRIO for Nobel Peace Prize, but is now arrested for purportedly disrupting peace!  However, the arrest of Zubair is perhaps winning him more acclaim and attention and he is somewhat of a hero in people’s eyes for debunking fake news.