Creator of ‘Sulli Deals’ app arrested from MP

Accused held by cybercrime branch of Delhi police

Delhi police on Sunday arrested suspected creator of ‘Sulli Deals’ app from Indore of Madhya Pradesh, police said.

The accused identified as Omkareswar Thakur (25) was arrested in Indore by the cybercrime branch of Delhi police on Saturday evening and taken to the national capital, the MP police said.

A relative of the accused said a two-member team of Delhi cybercrime branch landed in the house of the accused in Indore on Saturday afternoon to arrest him.

Omkareswar was however away in Nagda in Ujjain district in MP at the time.

Police arrested him when he returned home from Nagda in the same evening, his kin said unwilling to be quoted.

However, the Indore police said that they were not informed about the arrest by their Delhi counterpart.

“We learnt about his (Omkareswar’s) arrest from the media. Delhi police has not shared information regarding his arrest with us so far”, Indore police commissioner Harinarayanchari Mishra told this newspaper.

He said Indore police would launch an independent investigation into the matter after receiving relevant information from Delhi police.

According to Mishra, the accused who has done his master’s degree in computer application was a private software developer. His brother is working in a leading software company in the country.

This was the first arrest made in the ‘Sulli Deals’ app case. The application in which doctored photographs of Muslim women were uploaded was used to auction them.

Delhi Deputy Commissioner of Police (IFSO) K.P.S. Malhotra said during preliminary interrogation, the accused admitted that he was a member of a group on Twitter and the idea to defame and troll Muslim women was shared there.

“He had developed the code on GitHub. The access of GitHub was with all the members of the group. He had shared the app on his Twitter account. The photos of the Muslim women were uploaded by the group members,” the officer said.

Investigation has revealed that the accused had joined the group on Twitter by the name of ‘Tradmahasabha’ in January 2020 using the handle @gangescion.

During various group discussions, the members had talked about trolling Muslim women, the police said.

“He admitted that he had developed the code/app on GitHub. After the uproar regarding the Sulli Deals app, he had deleted all his social media footprints,” the DCP said.

The Delhi Police said that further analysis of technical gadgets is underway to find out the codes/images related to the app.

Arrest of alleged creator of ‘Bulli Bai’ app, another mobile application which auctioned Muslim women, Niraj Bishnoi three days ago led to the arrest of Omkareswar.

Niraj Bishnoi (21) is a second year student of a private engineering college in Sehore in Madhya Pradesh.

He is a resident of Jorhat in Assam. He has been suspended from his college following his arrest.