A New Delhi court on Tuesday remanded journalist Mohammed Zubair to police custody for four days, Live Law reported.
Delhi police on Monday arrested the Muslim co-founder of a fact-checking website, accusing him of insulting religious beliefs on Twitter, a network of digital media organizations said, condemning it as an attempt to harass him for his journalism.
The police on Tuesday produced Zubair at the Patiala House court and sought a five-day custody of the journalist. The police said that Zubair has been booked in other cases as well, ANI reported.
In court, the prosecution said the police need to recover Zubair’s laptop and other devices that were used to post the alleged objectionable tweet, Live Law reported.
Meanwhile, a Delhi Police official said that the 2018 tweet posted by Zubair had led to a “Twitter storm with hate speeches, detrimental to communal harmony”, PTI reported.
Zubair, who co-founded Alt News and regularly tweets on rising marginalization of the Muslim minority in the country, was arrested under two sections of a law related to maintaining religious harmony, said the DIGIPUB association.
Earlier this month, Zubair, drew attention to an incendiary remark about Prophet Muhammad made on TV by a spokesperson for Modi's ruling Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
With about half a million followers on Twitter, Zubair's tweet about the comments went viral. The BJP suspended the spokesperson for anti-Islam remarks and expelled another official in a bid to defuse domestic and international outrage.
Alt News's other co-founder, Pratik Sinha, said on Twitter no notice was given to Zubair before his arrest.
"He is currently detained inside a police bus in Burari for more than an hour," Sinha said.
A Delhi Police spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Monday. Calls to their office phone went unanswered.
Reuters partner ANI reported, citing Delhi Police sources, that Zubair was arrested based on a complaint from a Twitter account that said he insulted Hindus in a 2018 post commenting on the renaming of a hotel after the Hindu monkey god Hanuman.
Journalists demanded his immediate release.
"Journalist Zubair who routinely busted fake news, exposed the hate machinery in India has just been arrested," said Rana Ayyub, another Muslim journalist who often invites the wrath of Hindu hardliners. "The country is punishing those who reported, documented the decline."
Ten human rights organizations said on World Press Freedom Day last month that Indian authorities were increasingly picking on journalists and online critics for their criticism of government policies and practices, including by prosecuting them under counter-terrorism and sedition laws.
