Two defamation cases were filed against Anupam Tarafdar and Debojit Roy for the Facebook post.
Businessman Debojit Roy posted on social media that he had to walk five kilometres with his 18-month-old child and pregnant wife due to traffic restrictions in West Bengal during Durga Puja last month. He said there were no rickshaws on streets in Balurghat, about 400 km north of Kolkata, and wrote about his harrowing experience on Facebook. His post criticising the police was shared by several others who were caught in similar situations.
Mr Roy along with bank employee Anupam Tarafdar, who shared Roy's post, was arrested on October 19, and released on bail yesterday.
According to sources, some of the comments to the post were offensive and attacked a certain police officer. As soon as it came to police's notice, many people were called for questioning. While some of them apologised to the cops, Roy and Tarafdar didn't and were arrested.
Two defamation cases were filed against them -- one by the battery-operated rickshaw drivers association that claimed they were being maligned in their posts and the other by the police. These offences carry jail terms ranging from three months to 10 years.
The two were produced before court and remanded to police custody for two days. On Sunday, a special court granted them bail against a personal bond of Rs 2,000 each. However, the police haven't dropped the charges against them and investigation will continue, a senior officer said.