Chhattisgarh police arrest journalist Vinod Verma, allege extortion

Chhattisgarh police arrested senior journalist Vinod Verma on October 27 charging him with extortion and blackmail.

Police alleged Verma tried to extort money from Chhattisgarh PWD minister Rajesh Kumar.

Vinod Verma has been sent on transit remand by a Ghaziabad Court, ANI reported, adding that he will be presented before a Chhattisgarh court by police.

Vinod Verma told the media while he was being arrested that the Chhattisgarh government was unhappy with him because he had "a sex CD of the state minister, Rajesh Munat".  

Verma had earlier denied possession of any CD and had said that he was being framed. 

He said that he has nothing to do with the CD, he just had a pen drive. He later accepted that he had the CD.

Meanwhile, news agency PTI reported that the police seized 500 CDS, pen drives, laptops from Verma's house. 

"A huge quantity of CDs has been seized from the journalist's house. We are scrutinising the material to check whether there is any link to sex scandal involving higher-ups,"  PTI quoted senior Superintendent of Police H N Singh as saying.

The complaint was lodged by a man named Prakash Bajaj at Pandri police station in Raipur, PTI reported.

Vinod Verma is the executive member of Editors Guild of India and a former BBC journalist. He has been booked under the Information Technology (IT) Act, police said.

The Raipur police told the media that the contents of the CD violate Section 67 of the IT Act.