The Delhi police registered 44 FIRs and made 4 arrests, including two printing press owners, after anti-Narendra Modi posters were found on walls and poles in several spots in the nation's capital.
Some posters read "Modi hatao, desh bachao", seeking ouster of the PM.
At least 2,000 posters were removed and 2,000 more were seized when a van was intercepted.
Dependra Pathak, the Special Commissioner of Police (Law and Order of Northern Zone) told The Indian Express that the van was intercepted in I P Estate coming from the AAP headquarters on DDU Marg. One man was arrested at the time.
"The arrested man disclosed that he was asked by his employer to deliver the posters at AAP’s headquarters and that he had made a delivery a day earlier as well. We have arrested two other men and further investigations are on," Pathak added.
As per the police, two printing press firms received orders for 50,000 such posters each. Workers linked to both the companies pasted many of them from late Sunday night to Monday morning. The owners have been arrested for not publishing names of their printing presses on the posters.
This incident comes two years after Delhi police arrested 30 and lodged 25 FIRs over a similar incident when posters with remarks critical of the PM appeared during the Covid vaccine drive.
"Mostly, the FIRs were registered under the Prevention of Defacement of Public Property Act, and Press and Registration of Books Act," IE reported an officer as saying.
Officers added that three people were arrested from the Central district and one from the West.
Ghanshyam Bansal DCP (West) added that police were probing where the order was obtained from.