President revokes suspension of DoT official who sought action against Mishra

President Ram Nath Kovind revoked the suspension of Department of Telecommunication (DoT) official Ashish Joshi, who had in 2019 asked the Delhi Police to take action against then rebel Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) legislator, Kapil Mishra, over an alleged inflammatory video and a Twitter post.

In the post, Kapil Mishra emphasised the need to attack India’s “internal enemies” like journalist Barkha Dutt, and activists Prashant Bhushan, Kavita Krishnan, and Shehla Rashid.

Although back with the department of telecommunication that he was part of until his suspension, Joshi refused to comment when contacted by the Hindustan Times.

Joshi was suspended on February 26, 2019, after he approached the Delhi police commissioner for action against Kapil Mishra for circulating an “incendiary video” and allegedly provoking people to attack “against traitors” on YouTube and Twitter in violation of the Information Technology Act and Indian Penal Code. He was the controller of communications account in Dehradun.

A week before that, the IAS officer had also reportedly an order to telecom operators to crack down on “offensive or obscene messages” and set up a helpline to receive complaints against such customers.

Taking cognisance of his actions, the telecommunication department charged Joshi for what they claimed “misusing official letterhead for filing a complaint” against Mishra and also issuing orders to telecom operators on offensive messages with “malafide intent without having any jurisdiction or making any advance preparation to address complaints that would come in response to the order.”

The telecom claimed that the IAS officer the civil services conduct rules. Hindustan Times