‘Cyberbullying’ of Shipra: HC rejects writ petition challenging police officers

The High Court today rejected a writ petition filed challenging two police officers posting personal photographs of Shipra Debnath along with provocative comments on Facebook.

The bench of Justice JBM Hassan and Justice Md Khairul Alam passed the rejection order, saying that the petition was not placed properly.

Writ petitioner Manoj Kumar Bhowmick told The Daily Star that he prayed to the HC bench to reject the petition, considering that it was not presented before the bench as it was not convincing for passing any order to take action against the police officers.    

The HC bench said that there is an alternative way to get remedy from the lower court concerned on this issue, he said, adding that he might move the same writ petition before another HC bench.                       

Manoj Kumar Bhowmick, a Supreme Court lawyer, on August 16 submitted the writ petition as a public interest  litigation to the HC, seeking its order on the authorities concerned of the government to conduct a probe into this issue and take proper action against the police officers responsible for posting  the photographs on Facebook.

In the petition, the lawyer said the action of police officers of posting personal photographs of Shipra Debnath along with provocative comments on Facebook is illegal as it has "assassinated her character".

He submitted the writ petition based on a report published on The Daily Star on August 16 under the headline "Cyberbullying now adds to her trauma."

The report said, "Shipra Debnath, a student of Stamford University and a crew member of slain Maj (retd) Sinha MdRashed Khan, has fallen victim to cyberbullying, her family alleged."

"A group of people, including some top-ranking police officials, have been posting her personal photographs along with provocative comments on Facebook, trying to assassinate her character," the report said quoting her younger brother Shuvojit Kumar Debnath.

In one instance, Superintendent of Police Mostafijur Rahman of Satkhira shared some of her pictures on his Facebook profile on August 14 and took a dig at her character.

A similar post was made by Mohammad Mizanur Rahman Shelley, SP (Dhaka Metro - South) of the Police Bureau of Investigation, who also authored crime fiction books. He tried to justify the case filed against Shipra by sharing similar photos of her.