Milind Soman charged for obscenity after posting naked picture on social media

 A day after the police had arrested actor-model Poonam Pandey and her husband for allegedly trespassing on government property and shooting an "objectionable" video at a dam in Canacona town in South Goa, the state police have registered a case against model-actor Milind Soman for allegedly "promoting obscenity", after he recently posted a picture of himself running naked on a beach in Goa to mark his birthday, a police official said on Friday.

The case was registered Milind Soman on Friday, a day after Goa Suraksha Manch (GSM), a political outfit, lodged a complaint in this regard, he said.

Milind Soman had shared his picture on Instagram profile, which showed him running naked on a beach to mark his 55th birthday.

Soman, who turned 55 on Wednesday, had posted a photograph of him running nude by a beach in Goa, captioned “55 and running!” The photograph was clicked by his wife.

"Milind Soman has been booked under IPC section 294 (obscene act in public place) and section 67 of the Information and Technology Act after the complaint by Goa Suraksha Manch," Superintendent of Police (South Goa) Pankaj Kumar Singh said.

Political outfit Goa Suraksha Manch, in its complaint, alleged that the model had indulged in "obscenity at a public place". It also said that the picture projected Goa in a wrong manner.

Meanwhile, Poonam Pandey and her husband got bail from a court in south Goa on the same day. In the bail order, the judicial magistrate first class, Canacona, stated, “A professional shoot towards the making of a video or a film, in my considered opinion cannot be outright termed as obscene or immoral merely because some members of the public say so, or there is public outcry about the same. Films and videos are covered under the right to expression, which is a fundamental right granted by our Constitution.”

Interestingly, this is the second time Soman faces charges of obscenity. Earlier this year, Soman posted the old image on social media and had wrote, “what the reaction would have been if it had been released today…”

 In 1995, the Social Service Branch of Mumbai Police had booked him and model Madhu Sapre after they posed nude, wearing only a pair of shoes and a python wrapped around them, for an advertisement campaign. They were acquitted after a 14-year-long legal trial.