India News

Techie jailed due to Airtel mistake: police (Lead)

Nov 3, 2007, 11:33 GMT

Pune, Nov 3 (IANS) Police here have washed their hands off the wrongful detention of a 26-year-old techie from Bangalore, blaming telecom major and Internet service provider Airtel for giving them incorrect information. The company has promised action.

Lakshmana Kailash K. was picked up from Bangalore Aug 31 on the suspicion of having posted insulting images of Chhatrapati Shivaji on Internet networking site Orkut. He was brought to Pune and put behind bars. It was later found that he was innocent.

The police will take up the matter with Airtel for providing misleading information that led to the wrongful arrest of Lakshmna, Assistant Commissioner of Police Netaji Shinde told IANS.

'We did our investigations on the IP address provided to us by Airtel. It is not our fault and Lakshmana should take Airtel to court and not us,' he said.

An Airtel spokesperson said: 'We are aware of this incident and deeply distressed by the severe inconvenience caused to the customer. We are fully cooperating with the authorities to provide all information in this regard and we are in touch with the customer.

'We have robust internal processes, which we review frequently to make them more stringent. We have conducted a thorough investigation of the matter and will take appropriate action.'

While media reports said Lakshmana was released only three weeks after the other suspects were arrested, police maintained that the techie was not held longer than necessary.

© 2007 Indo-Asian News Service