Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu, Aug 20 (IBNS): The Coimbatore Police on Sunday arrested a man for allegedly forwarding a provocative Short Message Service (SMS) to several people from Northeast region residing in the city.
The man reportedly sent text messages to workers from Northeast region that warned them of a possible attacks on them stemming from the ethnic violence in Assam.
The arrested person was identified as B. Muhammed Sheik Hassain.
Hassain was a resident of South Ukkadam area of Coimbatore. He worked in a textile shop as a salesman.
The Cyber Crime Cell police arrested Hassain by tracing the origin of the message to Ukkadam area by acting on complaints on the matter.
Hassain said during interrogation that he forwarded the provocative SMS to more than 200 people.
He said he received the SMS on August 10.
He said he did not know about the origin of the text message.
Thousands of northeast Indians residing in Pune, Hyderabad, Bangalore and other cities had begun fleeing to their home states this week after reports and rumours of imminent attacks on them stemming from the ethnic violence in Assam.
The Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) on Friday banned bulk Short Message Service (SMS) and Multimedia Messaging Service (MMS) across the country for 15 days in the wake of mass exodus of people belonging to Northeast region of the country from different cities following rumours.
A cellphone user can send a message to not more than five persons for the next 15 days.
