Dark Side Of Social Media: Girls' Defamation Ignite New Wave Of Gender Conflict In MP

Bhopal (Madhya Pradesh): The crime branch police are receiving frequent complaints involving students creating fake social media accounts of their female classmates either to defame them or just out of mischief.

Many such cases have also been registered at other police stations with youths misusing social media to defame their ex-partners as revenge. In other cases, youths even created fake accounts of girls when they repulsed their advances, police officials said.

Crime branch has received around five such complaints in past months in which fake accounts of school girl students were created on Facebook and Instagram with their photographs.

The parents of the girls approached officials and made complaints when the victims learnt about the fake accounts in their names. In many such cases, photographs of the girls were morphed to create obscene social media accounts in a bid to defame them.

Officials said that in most such cases, victims had no knowledge about the culprits. However, during police investigation, their school mates and youths known to them were often found involved in creating their fake social media accounts.

Labourer’s number used

The accused are usually tech-savvy youths who dodge police. In one such case, cops had a tough time in identifying and tracing the culprit who used the mobile number of a labourer to create a fake social media account of his fellow student.

Cops were puzzled when they found the labourer using a basic keypad mobile phone. The real culprit was caught when the labourer later informed that the son of his employer had asked for his mobile number and sent an OTP on his phone.

Shocked parents

Parents of a 15-year-old school student were shocked when they discovered an obscene social media account being run in their daughter’s name.

Her photograph was morphed with obscene pictures and posted on social media to defame her. The parents moved a police complaint two days ago demanding to trace and arrest the accused.

Youths should be careful while using social media. Not only the victims and her parents but the whole family of the accused suffer from humiliation when they are caught in such cases.

Crime branch has been taking prompt and strict action in such cases and is also monitoring social media to identify such fake accounts.

-DCP (crime branch) Akhil Patel