New Delhi:
Delhi Police has registered a case against Zee News for allegedly showing forged annexure of a CAG report on coal block allocation, a charge dismissed by the channel as a "figment of imagination, mala fide and oppressive".
The Crime Branch registered the case alleging that the CAG report annexure shown by Zee News was forged, sources said.
They also said a case of cheating and forgery were registered after finding that the news channel allegedly forged a particular section of the CAG report.
Investigators have compared the actual CAG report with the screen grab from the show that Zee aired and spotted the forgery, they said.
Responding to the allegations, Zee counsel Vijay Aggarwal said, "This FIR is a counter offensive to investigation ordered by the court to be conducted by Station House Officer (SHO) at Tuglak road. The contents of FIR are a figment of imagination, mala fide and oppressive.
"Common citizens are not able to get FIR registered for their genuine grievances but this series of FIR on filmsy grounds show how Delhi Police is trying to please politicians."
A Zee statement alleged that the fresh FIR is a "repeat performance" of an earlier FIR by Congress Member of Parliament Naveen Jindal.
Mr Jindal had alleged that two Zee Editors had tried to extort Rs 100 crore from his company for not running a negative news story against his company. A case was registered in this regard in October and the two editors were arrested.