The Wire Files Complaint Against Researcher Devesh Kumar, blames him for forgery

New Delhi, 30 October 2022: On Sunday, The Wire has lodged a case against its researcher, Devesh Kumar, with the Delhi Police’s Economic Offenses Wing.

The site had recently published a report alleging Amit Malviya, the head of the BJP’s IT unit, who reportedly used his unique access at tech firm Meta to remove over 700 social media posts, which was followed by the police filing an FIR against the portal, its founder, and its editors.

Following this Malviya filed a complaint against The Wire’s creator Siddharth Vardarajan, editors Siddharth Bhatia, M K Venu, and Jahnavi Sen on Friday with the special commissioner of police (crime).

While the journalists have been charged with cheating, forgery with the goal to defraud, forgery with the intention to injure reputation, using a falsified document, defamation, criminal conspiracy, and common intention.

The police stated, “the complaint has been filed against Devesh Kumar who is allegedly involved in the fabrication of documents and forgery. This is in connection with all the Meta stories that were published this month.”

They are looking into the allegations and the complaint. There hasn’t yet been an FIR filed. The Tek Fog app story that Kumar co-wrote was quickly retracted by the Wire team after it was published, according to police.

While The Wire on Saturday clarified that the Wire’s statement from yesterday makes it abundantly evident that one of their team members provided the false information. The person was accused of fraud and deception by The Wire after it was properly filed a police complaint against them.

The site published follow-up stories, and its retraction and apology did not name him “despite harming my image,” Malviya added, despite Meta’s clear denial that the report had used fraudulent materials.