Thursday, July 25, 2019

Case registered against Arappor Iyakkam for ‘misuse of police logo’
A senior police official, under whose jurisdiction the case was registered, said, “Conducting meetings indoors is out of context in this case.

Published: 25th July 2019 06:19 AM |

By Express News Service

CHENNAI: Based on a complaint lodged by K Rakesh, a 35-year-old resident of GKM Colony, Peravallur, police registered a case against Chennai-based citizen rights group Arappor Iyakkam for allegedly misusing the police logo.In his complaint, Rakesh said that when he was registering for Arappor’s ‘Know your rights’ programme that was to be held on July 14, he found the Tamil Nadu police logo in the registration page. “The page said that they were inviting the city Police Commissioner and other officials to create awareness about how to approach police to file a complaint. However when I went there, no such event was held,” he said.

Responding to the complaint, Jayaram Venkatesan, convener of Arappor Iyakkam, said that the police had stopped the organisation’s ‘Know your rights’ programme that was supposed to be held on July 7. Following this, the organisation had extended a public invitation to top police officials to attend the event on July 14 for which they used the logo. “It may be called misuse only if we had used the logo for commercial purposes or for other benefits. We have not used it for any such purposes,” Jayaram told Express.

Meanwhile, Arappor Iyakkam released a copy of a letter allegedly sent by the Inspector of Peravallur station to the owner of the hall where the ‘Know your rights’ event was supposed to be held on July 14. The letter said the owner Mathiazhagan should not allow the indoor meeting unless necessary permission was granted by police officials concerned.

A senior police official, under whose jurisdiction the case was registered, said, “Conducting meetings indoors is out of context in this case. While anyone can conduct an indoor meeting, there is no provision in the law that allows the public to use any government emblem for the promotion.”



“The emblem should be used by organisations only when a representative of the government is present at the event. Once the emblem is placed in a website or put up in posters, it is considered an official gathering. It is under this provision we had to file an FIR against the organisation,” the official added.

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