Mayank Rawat (21), a BSc (Chemistry) student at Zakir Hussain College in Delhi University, was detained from his home in Pauri Garhwal’s Kotdwar township in Uttarakhand on Wednesday by Mumbai cybercrime police investigating the ‘Bulli Bai’ app case. His father is currently serving in the Indian Army in Jammu.
This is the case’s third arrest. Previously, Shweta Singh (18), a class XII passout from Uttarakhand, and Vishal Kumar Jha (21), a Bihar teenager pursuing engineering in Bengaluru, were apprehended.
According to police sources, Singh created the ‘Bulli Bai’ Twitter identity, which had five followers, including Rawat and Jha (he used two handles). The app’s author and the other two followers of Singh’s Twitter handle are now being sought by police.
Bulli Bai App scandal
On January 1, the scandal erupted after numerous Muslim women were “auctioned” on the GitHub-hosted ‘Bulli Bai’ app. A Twitter handle with the name @bullibai was also promoting the app, with a display photo of a Khalistani supporter. On the same day, Mumbai Police filed a complaint against the app.
“Some unknown person who is known to the trio established the Bulli Bai app,” Mumbai Police Commissioner Hemant Nagrale stated. “The exact reason for the app’s existence is unknown. We haven’t found any money transactions in the operations of those arrested so far “Nagrale continued.
Investigation by the Police force
According to police, Rawat started his Twitter account in 2020 and was conversing with @giyu@007, the same individual who had befriended Singh on social media – a Nepali national identified simply as Giyou.
According to a report by TOI,”On December 31, 2021, during a discussion, @giyu@007 sent him a link of Github platform and instructed him to capture as many as screenshots of the ‘Bulli Bai’ app and upload to his social media timeline so that they can agitate others and acquire more followers,” a police source told.
Rawat is accused of obtaining images and personal information about Muslim women from various social media sites without their permission and uploading them to the app. To disseminate these photos, he used a variety of Twitter names. “He grabbed at least eight screenshots on January 1 and posted them to his Twitter account. He attempted to delete the post on January 3, but it was too late, so he terminated his account “according to the source The screenshots were recovered after the Mumbai cybercrime police grabbed his phone.
Further investigations are underway.