The Bulli Bai app appeared to be a clone of Sulli Deals which had triggered a similar row last year. Once opened, a Muslim woman’s face was randomly displayed as Bulli Bai.
New Delhi: Barely six months after a derogatory ‘Sulli Deals’ site that uploaded photos of women for auction without their consent surfaced on the hosting platform ‘GITHUB’, a new mobile application targeting Muslim women by the name of ‘Bulli Bai’ has emerged. The controversy surrounding the ‘Bulli Bai’ popped up on January 1 after some influential women active on the social media, especially from the Muslim community, complained that their doctored photos were uploaded for sale online on the Github hosting platform.
Several women from journalists to a pilot to a Congress leader to the mother of a missing JNU student, found their names on the website, alongside degrading text ‘Bulli Bai of the Day’ meant to imply they were being auctioned. Some of the targeted women expressed frustration with not enough being done the last time, allowing the culprits to continue operating with impunity.
“I thought it was a Happy New Year message”
“It was January 1. I opened a message on WhatsApp from one of my friends and clicked ‘download’ on an image that had been sent, assuming that it was a ‘Happy New Year’ message. Instead, I saw a screenshot of my photo with the text that I am the ‘Bulli Bai of the Day’. I jumped out of bed in shock. It was not surprising because this is not the first time it has happened. But we have all been through so much in the last year, we are barely recovering from the trauma of the second wave. I really wanted to begin the year on a hopeful note and it was shocking to think that someone was sitting on the last day of the year and doing this to degrade us,” Indian Express quoted a journalist, on the basis of whose complaint an FIR has been registered by Delhi Police, as saying.
The mother of a JNU student who has been missing for over five years received calls, telling her that she too was listed on the website. She said she is ignoring it. “It makes no difference to me.”
Women who had been listed in the earlier case and had approached the police have also found themselves listed in the new website. One of them, a Congress leader, said: “I was shocked… it was happening all over again.… I had lodged a complaint even in May when a group of men were posting our photos on YouTube and asking for money from other men to continue the ‘entertainment’. I was in trauma. And then I filed an FIR for (the earlier GitHub case); I provided Delhi Police all the evidence, but they never helped me,” the report in the Indian Express quoted the leader as saying.
Another journalist, barely a year into the profession, also found that she was targeted. “The only things unifying all the women in the list is that they are all Muslim and they have all been vocal.”
A pilot, who had filed an FIR with Uttar Pradesh Police during the previous case, said: “I was hopeful and thought I would get justice but the UP Police never even called me for questioning. I called the investigating officer multiple times but it was all in vain. The men have now created another page. When I saw the screenshots, I was shocked and almost moved to tears… ”
21-Year-Old Bengaluru man detained by Mumbai Police
The Mumbai police on Monday detained a 21-year-old engineering student from Bengaluru, in connection with ‘Bulli Bai’ app case.
Earlier in the day, Delhi Police sought details from the GitHub platform about the developer of the ‘Bulli Bai’ mobile application and asked Twitter to block and remove related “offensive contents” on its platform. The police have also sought from Twitter information about the account handler who first tweeted about the app.
West Mumbai Cyber Police station registered a case against the ‘Bulli Bai’ app developers and Twitter handles that promoted the app on Sunday. The case has been registered against the unknown culprits under sections 153(A) (Promoting enmity between different groups on grounds of religion etc), 153(B) (Imputations, assertions prejudicial to national integration), 295(A) (Deliberate and malicious acts, intended to outrage religious feelings), 354D (stalking), 509 (word, gesture or act intended to insult the modesty of a woman), 500 (criminal defamation) of the Indian Penal Code and Section 67 (publishing or transmitting obscene material in electronic form) of Information Technology Act.
