The All India Congress Committee (AICC) has moved the Election Commission of India (ECI) against the Communist Party of India (Marxist)’s Kerala mouthpiece channel, Kairali, for allegedly disseminating fabricated pictures seeking to defame AICC general secretary K. C. Venugopal, MP. 

AICC legal cell chairperson Abhisekh Singhvi filed a petition seeking the ECI’s urgent intervention. The petition noted that the fabrication and subsequent dissemination of the picture on social media, including CPI(M) handles, constituted a violation of the model code of conduct.

Simultaneously, the Kerala Pradesh Congress Committee (KPCC) vice president, A. A. Shukur, filed a complaint against the channel at the Alappuzha North police station. 

He accused the channel of attempting to create enmity between different groups of people, of criminal conspiracy, of defamation, and of violating the IT Act. Mr Shukur termed the “fake news” an attempt to upend the legal democratic process through unethical and criminal means. 

In a press release, the KPCC stated that the fabricated picture sought to show Mr Venugopal accepting money from a person. The controversy centred on allegations that the Congress’s national leadership sought to sell Assembly seats in Haryana. 

The CPI(M) had stoked the controversy during the poll campaign in Kerala by spotlighting a complaint filed by an individual who claimed he had transferred significant sums of money to the bank accounts of several leaders to secure an Assembly seat for his wife, a functionary of the Haryana Mahila Congress.