The Superintendent of Police in Odisha's Berhampur shared an update on the arrest of four people in an assault case on social media and soon the post became viral. The police officer used different emojis to cover the faces of the accused persons. The emojis portrayed different emotions like one pleading, another disappointed and one frowning, adding humour to the post.
"Gopalpur Police team arrested four persons for assaulting a father and son," the SP said in a post on X on Friday and it crossed 1.3 million views till Monday morning. As many as 2,952 users have liked it, while 925 have reposted and 218 commented on the post by the time.
Police arrested the four men last Wednesday for allegedly assaulting K Ganesh Reddy (34) and his father K Kalu Reddy on November 4 following a quarrel, the police said.
"It's not for the first time, I have posted several arrested accused persons on social media sites, particularly in the official handle of X by covering their faces with emojis in the past," SP (Berhampur) Saravana Vivek M said.
Earlier, one of his posts of accused gamblers with emoji in X handle on October 16 had crossed 2,02,000 views followed by 5,306 viewers in a post on October 25, where a person was arrested by Berhampur Sadar police in a cheating case.
The police officer said hiding the face of the accused persons with emojis serves a dual purpose. "It serves a dual purpose - the accused will be faced with an embracing situation and also fulfil the Supreme Court guidelines which restrict to showing the face of the accused in public," the SP added.
Several people commented on the post and praised the officer's creativity. "Even AI couldn’t be that creative," wrote a person, while another said, "Funny to lag raha hai."