After court decision on the 2002 riots, activist Teesta Setalvad is detained

• Teesta Setlavad was a co-petitioner in the Supreme Court case.
• Yesterday denied the appeal against Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s acquittal in the 2002 Gujarat riots.
• Activist Teesta Setalvad was apprehended by the Gujarat Police’s Anti-Terrorism Squad in Mumbai on Saturday.

A day after the Supreme Court criticized individuals who “kept the pot boiling” about the 2002 Gujarat riots, activist Teesta Setalvad was apprehended by the Gujarat Police’s Anti-Terrorism Squad in Mumbai on Saturday.

Teesta Setlavad was a co-petitioner in the Supreme Court case that yesterday denied the appeal against Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s acquittal in the 2002 Gujarat riots.

As reported by NDTV, the Gujarat Police filed a charge against her this morning, citing a strongly worded Supreme Court decision that made references to Ms. Setalvad’s NGO, which has worked closely with riot victims.

In the case against the activist, which also names retired police officers RB Sreekumar and Sanjiv Bhatt, who also claimed that the Gujarat government prevented the police from quelling the riots, the activist is accused of fraud and falsifying records among other things.

Ms. Setalvad was a co-petitioner in the case that Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s exoneration was contested in and which the Supreme Court dismissed on Friday. The primary petitioner was Zakia Jafri, wife of deceased Congress MP Ehsan Jafri.

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The Supreme Court upheld the Special Investigation Team’s (SIT) decision to clear PM Modi, who was the Gujarat Chief Minister at the time, saying the case was “devoid of merits” and was “clearly, submitted for ulterior motive.”

The judges concluded that Ms. Jafri’s appeal was submitted “at the direction of someone” and stated that “all those involved in such abuse of process ought to be in the dock and proceeded with in accordance with law.”

Ms. Setalvad has previously run-ins with the CBI and Gujarat Police on claims of financial embezzlement at her NGO, which occurred after PM Modi took office as the country’s prime minister.

Hours before to her arrest, Ms. Setalvad was accused of spreading false information about the Gujarat riots and assisting in a campaign to damage Prime Minister Modi’s reputation by Union Home Minister Amit Shah in an interview with news outlet ANI.

“I gave the judgement a close read. Teesta Setalvad’s name is expressly mentioned in the ruling. I can’t recall the name of the NGO she ran, but it provided the police with false information on the riots “explained Mr. Shah.

Later in the interview, he stated, “I hastily read the ruling, but Teesta Setalvad’s name is clearly stated. It was Setalvad’s NGO that submitted an application including BJP members in each police station, and because of the intense media pressure, each application was taken as gospel.”

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