Bangalore cellphone mechanic Pasha alone sent SMSes to 20,000 people

Mangalore Today News Network

Bangalore, Aug 22, 2012: A 26-year-old cellphone mechanic named Pasha alone forwarded inflammatory images and SMSes to nearly 20,000 people using multiple SIM cars and cellphones in Bangalore, a probe by the local police reveals.

These images and SMSes triggered an unprecedented exodus of Northeast people from this cybercity to Assam.

Police sources said Pasha is a highly-skilled cellphone mechanic  and  police had often sought his assistance in retrieving cellphone data during their investigations in the past.

“We have given all the phones and the computer hard disk seized from Pasha’s shop to the cyber forensics laboratory to retrieve a log of all SMSes and MMSes sent and received on the phones.

"We hope to have a better understanding of the extent of the operation with this data,’’ police sources told a newspaper.

Two of Pasha’s associates, Tahseen Nawaz, 32, and Shahid Salman Khan, 22, both residents of Bangalore, have been arrested on charges of disseminating false information among the Muslims in the city.

Police sources said they are looking for a fourth person from whom Pasha is suspected to have received the original SMSes and MMSes that were later forwarded in mass numbers.

“Only the arrest of this fourth person who is also from Bangalore can throw light on how organised the disinformation campaign was and whether these people are linked to any disruptive elements,’’ said these sources.

“We think that only people somewhere in the middle of the links have been traced. We have to now examine the downward and upward links, going phone number by phone number,’’ a police official said. 

Pasha is among the three arrested here last week for sending SMSes and MMSes inciting violence against people from the Northeast.

The Bangalore police have sought the help of a cyber forensics lab at the Cyber Crimes Cell to retrieve details of all the messages sent by the trio.

Pasha has been accused of “spreading rumours through SMS and uploading videos through electronic means inciting hatred and emotional outrage against people of the Northeast”.

Courtesy: IndiaTV