Nagpur: Heated exchanges and provocative posts from rival communities had taken social media by storm during the Israel-Gaza war around a month ago, with rivals spewing venom at each other. Though such posts, many of which were also uploaded from the city, were mostly ignored then, they seem to have emboldened the users, who went berserk on March 17, leading to the central Nagpur riot at Mahal, around 2km away from the RSS headquarters.
Sources said that 51 users from different communities, including engineers, businessmen, shop owners, traders, and even women, have been named as accused by the cyber cell unit for posting, sharing, and re-sharing hate messages and inflammatory posts, apart from uploading videos of the protest against Aurangzeb’s tomb, and later, the scenes of riots with one community attacking the cops. Several videos of the protest against Aurangzeb’s tomb were edited and morphed before being uploaded to further aggravate the already irate mob.
Sources said that another community also targeted a group for attacking cops on the road. The heated posts and messages turned the social media turf into a war zone at least two hours before the riot, and continued even after the riot ended. Though the cyber security cell surveillance teams managed to delete some posts and identify their users, the damage was already done, as the fight had spilled over onto the streets.
Police sources said the two groups unleashed an acerbic attack on each other for at least four hours on social media, reaching such a cresendo that the rioters were instigated by such content before hitting the streets. The rioters then took on the cops at around 7.30pm, with the epicentre at Mahal and elsewhere in central Nagpur. It’s also learnt that some of the users were booked for creating fake narratives on the riots with misleading captions meant to provoke and spread hate. These posts attracted tremendous traction, with their contents getting shared and re-shared among thousands. A known social media influencer was also one of the accused.
“A certain section of the commentators and social media users posted numerous messages on the Gaza-Israel war justifying their community’s actions and participation. These users started spreading inflammatory messages on the Aurangzeb tomb protest too. These users were identified and booked,” said a cyber cell official.
Sources said that the users booked for instigating the riots also shared similar hate and provocative messages during the Israel war and other global issues involving their community. The users mostly shared violent or provocative posts to extend and garner support for their community on the Israel war issue.
Sources stated the cyber cell is now waiting for detailed information on the IP addresses of the users to track their locations. Though mostly users from Nagpur and surrounding regions used their social media handles to target each other and rival communities before the riot, sources said that cyber sleuths have discovered that the posts and comments have also been generated from other states too. Such posts too are now under scanner.
The cops also said users of various age groups and backgrounds had participated in the social media spats, just like the variety of professions. “The communities had been at loggerheads not only over Israel and Gaza war, but they had been instigating and targeting each other over every issue whether in India or abroad,” said a cop on condition of anonymity, adding that it becomes challenging to take action against every inflammatory post as the cyber cops are also saddled with substantial number of fraud and cheating cases.
“With manpower constraints, it is difficult for the current strength of the cyber cell to effectively monitor and take action on inflammatory posts. We do it during sensitive periods and also randomly, but are certainly outnumbered by the huge numbers of users in comparison to handful of staffers for monitoring purposes,” said the cop.
