New Delhi: After the Republic news organisation ran a segment implying that the Istanbul Congress Center convention hall was an office of the Congress party, police in Congress-ruled Karnataka registered an FIR against the BJP’s IT cell chief Amit Malviya and Republic head Arnab Goswami, invoking provisions dealing with intent to provoke riots and to breach the peace.Meanwhile, hours before the FIR was lodged on Tuesday (May 20), Republic issued an apology for “erroneously depicting a building as the Congress office in Turkey”.Malviya, named as accused no. 1 in the FIR, had on Saturday reposted a clip by Republic Digital that showed the Istanbul Congress Center while host Goswami asked “did you know viewers, the Congress party has a registered office in Turkey?”The video was circulated at a time when there was some public opposition to Turkey’s support for Islamabad amid the recently concluded India-Pakistan conflict.However, Republic issued a statement soon after 5 pm on Tuesday saying a video editor with its digital desk “inadvertently” used an “incorrect image erroneously depicting a building as the Congress office in Turkey … due to a technical error”.The video in question did not appear on Goswami’s show on Friday and was carried on Republic’s digital platform after the show ended, it added. “The moment it was brought to our attention, it was promptly rectified. We sincerely and unconditionally regret the error.”Around two hours later, police in Bengaluru’s High Grounds police station registered an FIR against Malviya and Goswami invoking sections 192 and 352 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS) based on the complaint of one Shrikant Swaroop B.N., the legal cell of the Congress’s youth wing announced.Section 192 of the BNS deals with ‘wantonly giving provocation with intent to cause riot’, while section 352 pertains to ‘intentional insults with intent to provoke breach of peace’. The former is a cognisable offence, meaning the police are enabled to arrest without warrant.PTI identified Swaroop as the Indian Youth Congress’s “legal cell head”. The Congress is in power in Karnataka.Swaroop claimed in his complaint that Malviya and Goswami intended to “deceive the Indian public, defame a major political institution, manipulate nationalist sentiments, incite public unrest and undermine national security and democratic integrity” by spreading the “fabricated” claim that the Istanbul Congress Center is an office of the grand old party.Accusing the duo of “masterminding a heinous and criminally motivated campaign to disseminate patently false information”, Swaroop claimed that their actions at a time of ‘strained India-Turkey relations’ sought to “deliberately [leverage] public resentment against Turkiye to falsely associate the INC [Congress] with a nation currently viewed as antagonistic”.The two also aimed to ‘incite public unrest’, Swaroop went on to allege, by “sowing division, mistrust and potential violence among citizens by exploiting sensitive geopolitical issues with the intent to destabilise social harmony”.They even tried to ‘subvert the national interest’ by “undermining India’s democratic framework and national security by spreading disinformation that misleads voters, erodes trust in institutions and risks escalating tensions with a foreign nation”, per Swaroop, who added that what they did amounted to a criminal conspiracy meant to “destabilise the nation” among other things.In an X post containing images of the FIR, the Indian Youth Congress said the FIR was registered “under the direction of” its functionaries and claimed that “this malicious attempt to malign” the Congress, “provoke unrest and undermine national security is a direct attack on democracy”.It also accused Malviya and Goswami of “defaming the constitutional office” of Lok Sabha leader of opposition Rahul Gandhi, although Swaroop’s complaint does not mention the leader.Following Ankara’s support to Islamabad during Indo-Pakistan hostilities earlier this month, India revoked its security clearance to the Turkey-headquartered airport services firm Celebi for “national security” reasons and also deferred the ceremony in which the Turkish ambassador in New Delhi was to formally commence his posting.Even as the Congress has moved to seek criminal action against Malviya and Goswami, the Ankara-based Anadolu news agency had reported in 2019 that the Congress’s overseas wing ‘opened an office’ in Istanbul.The overseas Congress issued a statement saying that a party member named Mohammad Yusuf Khan “will help build IOC organisation & institution in Turkey”, Anadolu quoted it as saying.However, The Wire was unable to independently corroborate the statement or determine whether such an office still exists.Alt News reported that since the 2019 announcement, there have been no updates on whether an actual office was set up because the IOC website mentions the countries where it has a presence, where Turkey is not featured.