FIR Alleging Fraud Filed Against Journo Rana Ayyub Over COVID Relief Campaign

The complaint, which alludes to three charity campaigns initiated by Ayyub, has been filed by 'Hindu IT Cell'.

File image of journalist Rana Ayyub.

(Photo Courtesy: Facebook/ Rana Ayyub)

A First Information Report (FIR) was filed against journalist Rana Ayyub at the Indirapuram police station, Ghaziabad, on Tuesday, 7 September, in connection with her fundraising campaigns.

The FIR, which has been filed by a group named 'Hindu IT Cell', has been registered under the sections of money laundering, cheating, dishonest misappropriation of property, and criminal breach of trust.

The Hindu IT Cell has alleged that Ayyub had been "illegally acquiring money from the general public in the name of charity."

The FIR has alluded to three crowdfunding campaigns initiated by Ayyub between April 2020-June 2021, facilitated by the virtual platform Ketto.

The three campaigns had been launched for the aid of slum dwellers and farmers, relief work for Assam, Bihar, and Maharashtra, and help for COVID-10 impacted people of India.

"Ms. Rana Ayyub happens to be a journalist by profession and was receiving foreign money without any kind of approval certificate/registration from the government," the FIR alleges lodged against the journalist has alleged.

Ayyub, who is a staunch critic of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), is a global opinions journalist and regularly writes for leading media outlets such as The New York Times and The Washington Post.

An FIR had been filed against Ayyub in June for allegedly "giving communal colour" to an incident involving the harassment of an elderly Muslim man in Uttar Pradesh's Loni district. She had subsequently been granted interim protection from arrest by the Bombay High Court.