Daijiworld Media Network - Mumbai

Mumbai, Aug 30: Kalachowki police have registered an FIR against an unidentified person for allegedly creating and uploading objectionable YouTube videos falsely portraying a 55-year-old Byculla photography teacher as the husband of Mumbai Mayor Ritu Tawde.

The FIR was registered on August 27 after the teacher approached the police, alleging that the owner of the “gk-shorts-videos” YouTube channel had used photographs of him and Tawde to create and broadcast defamatory short videos with an intention to malign them.

The teacher came across the content on August 26 after a woman residing on the first floor of his building sent him a YouTube link through WhatsApp.

According to the FIR, the link opened a short video on the “ha.shorts-videos” channel. The video allegedly contained details about the teacher, including his name, education, profession, religion, hobbies and family background. It displayed a photograph of Tawde alongside his photograph and portrayed him as her husband.

The teacher told police that his photograph appeared to have been taken from Facebook, while Tawde’s photograph seemed to have been sourced from social media. The video was apparently uploaded on August 23.

Police are now seeking information about the “gk-shorts-videos” channel, which was created on April 15 and has around 1.53K subscribers and 243 videos featuring political leaders and film personalities.

Investigators are collecting internet protocol (IP) details to identify the person operating the channel.

The teacher has also submitted screenshots of the alleged video to police as part of the investigation.