The Delhi Police on Wednesday said they were examining over 100 GB of data retrieved from gadgets of Mumbai-based advocate Nikita Jacob, an accused in the toolkit document case . The police had visited her Goregaon residence on February 11 and seized two of her laptops and one mobile phone.
Police said the data revealed that the toolkit had been referred to as “comms package”, which, according to investigators, meant communication package. “It has been found that several applications were used for communication — including Telegram, Signal, Proton, Cyberghost, and Signal.”
A senior police officer said Ms. Jacob got climate change activist Disha Ravi involved in creating the toolkit because she knew her to be a well-known climate activist and also close to Greta Thunberg who could help them amplify their movement or voices. “They basically wanted to approach Greta through Ms. Ravi. It has also been found that Ms. Jacob was operating e-mail account of Poetic Justice Foundation,” added the officer.
Sources said Ms. Jacob was in touch with U.S. activist Pieter Friedrich and also exchanged conversation with him. Deputy Commissioner of Police (Special Cell) Manishi Chandra said Mr. Friedrich had been on their radar since 2005. His name — in the toolkit — appeared alongside all the social media handles to follow including fact-checking websites, “left wing” news websites. The officer said the conversation was about use of VPN (Virtual Private Network).
The Delhi police have sought details from WhatsApp regarding members on the group created allegedly by Ms. Ravi which she is accused of deleting later. Details have also been sought from Zoom regarding a call which was organised on January 11 and was attended by Ms. Jacob and another accused Shantanu Muluk, a Beed native engineer-cum-activist.
Police said that while going through the mobile phone data of Ms. Jacob, they had found two more names, Shubham and Thilak, who were also the part of the 70-member WhatsApp group that was formed to amplify the toolkit.
In a related development, the banned group “Sikhs for Justice” released a 3-minute video on YouTube in support of Ms. Ravi, actor Deep Sidhu, Ms. Jacob, and activist Nodeep Kaur. All but Ms. Jacob are lodged in jail in different cases related to the farmers’ protest. Police sources said on Tuesday that while no link between the SFJ and “pro-Khalistani” group Poetic Justice Foundation had been found so far, they were probing if there was any.
Published - February 17, 2021 11:09 pm IST
