Mysuru man, who filed MUDA scam complaint against Siddaramaiah, arrested for defaming govt official

Following his complaint, a case was registered on February 18.

During the course of the investigation, Bengaluru city cyber crime police officials collected digital evidence submitted by the complainant and examined the content uploaded on Facebook, including the disputed audio clip. This allegedly led them to Krishna.

After obtaining a search warrant from the jurisdictional court, the police conducted a search at Krishna’s residence in Mysuru and seized materials allegedly linked to the offence. Police said he was issued a notice to appear before the Cyber Crime police station and was subsequently questioned in connection with the case, following which he was arrested.

Krishna was booked under sections 66 (C) (identity theft) and 66 (D) (cheating by personation using computer resources) of the Information Technology (IT) Act and under sections 336 (forgery) and 340 (using forged document or electronic record as genuine) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS).

“We have secured digital evidence and seized certain materials during the search. Further investigation is underway to ascertain the extent of circulation of the defamatory content and whether others were involved in creating or sharing it,” a police officer said.

It was acting on Krishna’s complaint that a special court had directed registration of an FIR after Governor Thawarchand Gehlot granted sanction in September 2024 to prosecute Siddaramaiah.

The Karnataka Lokayukta police, which investigated the allegations, later filed a ‘B’ report (closure report) in February 2025, citing lack of evidence against Siddaramaiah, his wife, brother-in-law Mallikarjun Swamy and a former landowner, J Devaraj.

On January 28, 2026, the special court accepted the ‘B’ report. Following the controversy, Siddaramaiah’s wife had returned the 14 housing sites to MUDA in 2024.

Further investigation in this case is underway.