By IANS
New Delhi : A city court Tuesday remanded television reporter Prakash Singh, arrested for doing a fake sting operation, in two days’ police custody even as police interrogated schoolteacher Uma Khurana who was allegedly framed in the report.
Prakash, arrested last week, was produced before Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Alok Aggarwal.
“The court has remanded Prakash, reporter with private television channel Live India, to two days’ police custody for further interrogation,” said an official of Delhi Police’s Crime Branch investigating the case.
The court rebuked police and asked why Prakash was not interrogated before the arrest.
“Prakash and Khurana should be confronted in the court with each other to know the real picture,” the judge suggested.
The court also said it would hear the matter on Sep 14 to decide whether Rashmi Singh, an aspiring journalist who was arrested for posing as a school student and victim of a prostitution racket allegedly run by Khurana, should be accepted as approver in the case or not.
Rashmi, who was arrested last week, had told the court that she wanted to become an approver and Prakash had kept her in the dark about her role in the undercover operation where she posed as a victim of the prostitution racket.
Earlier in the day, Crime Branch sleuths questioned Khurana.
“We have questioned Uma Khurana in the afternoon to take further the probe into the sting operation conducted by a television news channel,” the Crime Branch official said.
“She was questioned in detail and was asked to provide all information concerning her, businessman Virender Arora with whom she had a financial dispute and television reporter Prakash Singh.
“Khurana was also questioned about Rashmi Singh,” the official told IANS.
“We have interrogated her for the first time to know her side of the story. Only on the basis of her statement will we be able to reach any conclusion.”
Khurana, 41, had been arrested last month and remanded in judicial custody following the telecast of the claimed ‘sting operation’.
The ‘expose’ purportedly showed Khurana, who teaches mathematics at the Sarvodaya Kanya Vidyalaya at Asaf Ali Road in central Delhi, forcing many of her girl students into prostitution and pornography.
Following the telecast a mob attacked the school and manhandled the teacher, who was dismissed by the Delhi government Sep 1. She was arrested the next day on charges of immoral trafficking.
A week later, it was discovered that the operation was a hoax as the woman shown as the victim was in fact not a student but an aspiring journalist – Rashmi Singh.
Prakash, who had carried out the ‘sting operation’, was arrested and booked under various sections of the Indian Penal Code, including those related to cheating and criminal conspiracy.