The jingle is defaming the force, say police

The Delhi Police have asked all radio stations in the Capital to stop playing an Aam Aadmi Party jingle which according to them is defaming the force.

In the radio jingle, a woman is heard saying that some young men eve-teased her and passed lewd comments while she was on her way back home from tuition classes. She goes on to claim that she went to the police station to register a complaint, but the policemen kept asking her questions related to the incident. Fed up with the questions, she decides to come out of the police station without registering a complaint.

“For the past few days, the AAP has been running a radio jingle on most radio channels defaming the police. When it came to our notice, we asked all the radio stations to stop playing the jingle,” confirmed a senior police officer.

The radio stations have complied with the police direction and stopped playing the jingle from Friday evening. The police have further directed the radio stations to take clearance before playing any such jingles in future.

In the light of the Uber rape case, the jingle was played on the radio stations, wherein the victim urges people to bring back Arvind Kejriwal. “Bring back Arvind Kejriwal in Delhi, he will ensure that the city is a safer place for women and no such incidents will happen,” the jingle says.

In the meantime, the police have planned to approach the AAP to verify whether the girl in the advertisement is a real victim or a character of fiction.

“We maintain a diary in all the 161 police stations. There are closed circuit television cameras in most police stations. We want to know if the girl is a real victim and which police station she went to,” said the officer.

The police will also probe the time of the incident, talk to the girl who claims to be the victim and ask her to identify the police officials.

“There are women helpdesks at all the police stations and whenever a woman or girl enters a police station, women police officials immediately respond to them.”

The police station concerned said there was no PCR call made by the girl who identified herself in the jingle.

On its part, the AAP reacted strongly to the police action, calling it illegal. A party spokesperson told The Hindu : “When an advertisement is played on a radio channel the responsibility of the content lies with the advertiser and not with the radio station. If the Delhi Police are asking the radio channels to stop playing the advertisement and asking them to take clearance in future, they are doing an illegal thing. They are, in a way, threatening the radio stations.”

“Why should they stop the jingle from being played on radio. It is not our figment of imagination. The girl who is heard speaking in the jingle is a real victim who contacted us,” he added.