Delhi Police writes to Zoom, seeks details of toolkit meeting participants ahead of Republic Day

Police alleged that Mumbai lawyer Nikita Jacob and Pune engineer Shantanu were among the around 70 people who had attended the meeting through Zoom app

Nikita Jacob and Shantanu were among the 70 participants of a Zoom meeting on the farmers' protest toolkit held on January 11. Credit: DH Photo/B H Shivakumar

The Delhi Police have written to Zoom seeking details of the January 11 meeting organised on the popular video conferencing platform by pro-Khalistan outfit "Poetic Justice Foundation" to prepare a 'toolkit' on farmers' protest.

The action came after police on Monday claimed that Mumbai lawyer Nikita Jacob and Pune-based engineer Shantanu attended a Zoom conference on January 11 organised by PJF to discuss the toolkit.

DH Deciphers | What's a toolkit? Why is everyone talking about it?

A senior police official said that the Zoom has been approached by the investigators seeking details of all those who attended the meeting. Police had claimed that around 60-70 people attended the online meeting.

According to police, Disha Ravi, Nikita and Shantanu collaborated to create the toolkit and distributed among a select few. Disha shared it with Swedish teen activist Greta Thunberg, they said.

Also read — How Greta Thunberg's 'toolkit' tweet set India abuzz

Nikita and Shantanu were contacted by PJF's Mo Dhaliwal through a Canada-based woman Puneet, Joint Commissioner of Police (Cyber Cell) Prem Nath claimed on Monday.

It was during the Zoom meeting that the modalities of the toolkit were discussed, he claimed.

Also read — Delhi Police draw flak over 'illegal' arrest of Disha Ravi

"On January 11, Nikita and Shantanu attended the Zoom Meeting organized by Poetic Justice Foundation in which the modalities of the Global Day of Action were worked out. Based on the course of action decided in the Zoom meeting, Nikita, Shantanu, Disha and others collaborated together to draft the Toolkit document," Prem Nath said.

"The document that they drafted had secessionist and pro-Khalistani content embedded into it through links and texts," he claimed.

Investigators exploring options of approaching WhatsApp came a day after Joint Commissioner of Police Prem Nath claimed that Disha had deleted a Whatsapp group which she created to spread the toolkit.

Police also claimed that Disha had asked Greta Thunberg, who shared the toolkit on Twitter, to delete her post fearing that it could lead to invoking UAPA against her. They also claimed Greta deleted it on Disha's request.

Disha is claimed to have written to Greta on WhatsApp, saying, "Okay can you not tweet the toolkit at all. Can we just not say anything at all for a while. I am gonna talk to lawyers. I am sorry but our names are on it and we can literally get UAPA against us."