India's Mumbai Police Cyber Cell on Wednesday arrested a man from Hyderabad city for recently threatening to rape former T20 Indian cricket team captain Virat Kohli’s daughter.
The accused has been identified as 23-year-old Ramnagesh Alibathini. He is a software engineer.
The rape threat for the 10-month-old girl was made after Kohli extended his support to fast bowler Mohammed Shami, who was subjected to online abuse after the Indian cricket team lost a match by 10-wickets to Pakistan in the ongoing T20 Cricket World Cup 2021.
"Attacking someone over their religion is the most, I would say, a pathetic thing that a human being can do," Kohli had said.
Hours after Kohli's comments, Twitter account @Criccrazyygirl, which was deleted on 1 November, issued rape threats to Virat and Anushka Sharma’s daughter.
Before the account was deleted, the screenshot of the tweet was captured by a few Twitter users. "Waiting for Vamika Photos to get revealed so that we can fcuk her," the screenshot read.
The Delhi Commission for Women (DCW) had taken suo-motu cognisance on reports of online rape threats to Kohli’s daughter.
As per reports, the DCW had asked the Deputy Commissioner of Police to provide them with a copy of the First Information Report (FIR), details of the accused identified and arrested, and detailed action taken report by 8 November.
Issuing a notice to the Delhi Police, the DCW had described the online trolling of Kohli and his family as a “serious matter” and asked for “immediate attention”.
Ahead of the commencement of the T-20 world cup, Kohli had announced that he would give up the captaincy of the T20 cricket team after the tournament. He, however, continues to be the skipper of the One Day International cricket team and Test Team.
India suffered losses to Pakistan and New Zealand in its opening matches, due to which it failed to qualify for the knockout round of the T20 Cricket World Cup despite going on to win three consecutive matches.