In May 2020, a journalist named Dhaval Patel wrote a news report suggesting that then Gujarat Chief Minister Vijay Rupani’s government would soon fall. Patel, the editor of a web portal called Face of Nation, claimed this was due to Rupani’s “failure” in handling the Covid pandemic.

Days later, Patel, a resident of Ahmedabad, was picked up by the police and charged with sedition. Journalists in Gujarat were up in arms, blacking out their display photos on social media and demanding that they, as journalists, be arrested too. 

Yet when another journalist in Gujarat was arrested four years later, the local media fraternity was oddly silent.

At 8.30 am on October 7, an FIR was filed following a complaint by Himanshu Shekhar Chandra, senior intelligence officer at the Directorate General of GST Intelligence, which is the apex investigative agency for matters relating to the violation of the Goods and Services Tax. A case was registered under sections 420 (cheating), 467 (forgery of valuable security), 468 (forgery for the purpose of cheating), 471 (use of a forged document as genuine), 474 (possession of forged document) and 120B (criminal conspiracy) of the Indian Penal Code. 

On the same day, Ahmedabad Crime Branch registered the case and raided 14 different locations in Ahmedabad, Junagadh, Surat, Kheda and Bhavnagar. One of these was the home of journalist Mahesh Langa, who works as the senior assistant editor with The Hindu. 

“Early in the morning, his [Langa’s] wife was brought to the Crime Branch office for questioning,” an officer from Ahmedabad Police’s Crime Branch told Newslaundry. “After talking to her, we found that she has no role. Mahesh Langa does all the work. His wife's phone is used only for OTP. Based on the conversation, Mahesh Langa was called for questioning late in the evening and after about seven-eight hours of questioning, he was arrested on October 8.”

This first FIR did not name Langa, but two more FIRs would be filed in the coming days that did identify the journalist among the accused. The police officials we spoke to hinted that there may be a fourth FIR against Langa. 

While some organisations like the Press Club of India have condemned Langa’s arrest, the reaction has been muted, particularly among local media in Gujarat. A journalist who has previously been actively involved in protesting press censorship, said, “In the case of Mahesh Langa, it is not yet clear whether the action taken against him is due to his work. He has not done any report in the last one or two years which would have any impact on the government. In such a situation, no one is ready to come on the road for him.”

The first FIR

According to the FIR filed on October 7, a shell company named Dhruvi Enterprises in Bhavnagar falsified documents to obtain GST registration and issued fake invoices to 12 different companies, which then made fraudulent claims to the GST department. “This FIR is about fraud, not GST theft,” clarified a Crime Branch officer. 

One of the 12 companies is DA Enterprises, accused of tax-related fraud amounting to Rs 6,61,000. Incidentally, this is one of the lower amounts listed in the FIR. Arham Steel tops the list with Rs 36,43,358. Another, Aryan Associates, belongs to the son and nephew of Bharatiya Janata Party legislator Bhagbhai Dhanabhai Barad. Sources told Newslaundry that both were questioned by the police and then released.