Punjab Police Arrest YouTuber Rachit Kaushik for Hurting Religious Sentiments

Punjab Police arrested Youtuber and content creator Rachit Kaushik for allegedly hurting religious sentiments and promoting enmity between communities on Wednesday. According to the information, Salem Tabri police had availed an arrest warrant from the court and arrested the accused, who runs a channel on the video sharing platform as well as other social media networks under the label of “Sab Lok Tantra”, from Uttar Pradesh.Earlier, posts about the arrest of the Youtuber after he uploaded a video about an alleged expose on Delhi chief minister and Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) convener Arvind Kejriwal were doing rounds on social media.

Ludhiana commissioner of police Kuldeep Singh Chahal has since confirmed the development, saying Kaushik had been booked for hurting religious sentiments and promoting enmity between different groups on the basis of religion.A first information report (FIR) had been lodged against the Kaushik after a complaint from Alisha Sultan, a pastor at the Church of God near Jalandhar Bypass on January 17, 2024.The complainant had alleged that the then unidentified accused had made derogatory remarks against the Christian community. The accused had at the time been booked sections 295A (deliberate and malicious acts intended to outrage religious feelings of any class by insulting its religion or religious beliefs), 153 (wantonly giving provocation with intent to cause riot), 504 (intentional insult with intent to provoke breach of the peace) of the Indian Penal Code and section 67 of Information and Technology Act. Since the arrest of Kaushik, social media platform ‘X’ has been flooded with hashtags “Justice for Baba" and “Rachit Kaushik kidnapped" on X . Delhi-based BJP leader Tajinder Bagga took to social media platform X to draw a connection between Rachit Kaushik's arrest and the YouTuber's video on alleged exposé of Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal’s son. Tajinder Bagga was also arrested by Punjab police earlier.