Two Zee editors arrested for 'Rs 100-crore extortion bid'

NEW DELHI: Delhi Police's crime branch arrested two editors of the Zee group on Tuesday, acting on a complaint by Congress MP Naveen Jindal who had accused the two of trying to extort Rs 100 crore worth of advertisements from his company in return for dropping stories linking the Jindal group with Coalgate.
The arrested journalists are Sudhir Chaudhary and Sameer Ahluwalia, editorial heads of Zee news and Zee business channels, respectively, a senior police officer said.
"Prima facie evidence of criminal conspiracy and extortion has been found against the two leading to their arrest," said S B S Tyagi, DCP, crime branch on Tuesday.
The editors had earlier denied the charges, calling it an attempt to target investigative journalism.
Police said the arrests came after forensic experts submitted a report stating the CD submitted by the MP which contained audio and video recording of conversations between the Zee editors and Jindal's officials, was "not doctored". Jindal had claimed to have done a "reverse sting" on the journalists to expose them.
The inter-state cell of crime branch said it had found other conclusive evidence against the Zee journalists.
"The two editors were called for questioning on Tuesday during which they could not give satisfactory answers to our questions. They were informed around 8.30pm about their arrest after four hours of questioning. They will be produced in a Saket court at 2pm on Wednesday," a senior cop said.
Earlier, Jindal Steel and Power Ltd (JSPL) had provided the police with audio recordings of telephone conversations and video recordings of three meetings held on September 13, 17 and 19, between Zee and officials of Jindal's company, JSPL, at Hyatt Regency hotel in Delhi. In its FIR, JSPL had also named Essel Group chairman Subhash Chandra and his son Punit Goenka as co-accused, alleging criminal conspiracy, extortion, criminal intimidation and defamation by Zee News Ltd and its officials, police sources said.
In mid-October, the Broadcast Editors' Association had removed Sudhir Chaudhary from the post of treasurer and from primary membership of the body.
The crime branch had registered an FIR against Chaudhary, Ahluwalia and others for allegedly trying to extort Rs 100 crore from the Jindal company. The FIR was lodged under sections of extortion after the HR head of JSPL gave a written complaint to the police.
The complainant alleged that the two had met officials of the Jindal group and told them that reports against them could be dropped if the amount was paid. Several phone calls were exchanged on the issue. When JSPL declined to pay the money, Zee ran a series of malicious news items targeting the company, the complainant alleged.
Reacting to the move, Sudhir Chauhary earlier told TOI that the allegations were false and fabricated. "Jindals were the biggest beneficiaries in the coal block allocation scam and we had exposed them. If they are targeting us, they are targeting investigative journalism. It's an attempt to malign us and seems a result of their frustration after being exposed," he had said.