A team of the Gujarat Police Crime Branch on Monday (August 17) conducted a search at the Delhi home of independent journalist Ravi Nair and seized three laptops, two phones and an iPad.The seized electronic devices included those belonging to Nair’s son and a colleague of the journalist’s, sources said.Nair is facing charges of defamation and forgery in Ahmedabad following a complaint over a news report and posts on X about the Adani Group.On August 11, the Gujarat High Court had refused to quash an FIR registered by the Ahmedabad Detection of Crime Branch (DCB) against Nair on May 29 this year over an article published in ‘The Washington Post’, which had alleged that the Life Insurance Corporation of India (LIC) had been directed to make large investments in Adani Group companies.The High Court had held that the allegations in the FIR were materially different from an earlier private defamation complaint, and prima facie indicated cognizable offences that required investigation.Action ‘as per the law’, say policeThe Gujarat Police team was accompanied by personnel from the Delhi Police during the search. Nair was not at home at the time. Police were told that he had gone to Kerala, it is learned.A senior Delhi Police officer said the Delhi Police had assisted the Gujarat Police as per protocol.Story continues below this adA senior official of the Gujarat Police told this newspaper that a unit of the force had seized the electronic devices from Nair’s Delhi residence as part of their investigation into the FIR following the HC’s order last week, based on a warrant issued by a Magistrate Court in Ahmedabad.The Gujarat Police officer said that Nair was not present in his house at the time of the seizure, and that the action had been taken “as per the law”.Nair’s colleague told The Indian Express that she was at Nair’s residence with his son when the police team arrived at 2.40 pm on Monday.“The officials showed us a search warrant and collected some gadgets. There were three laptops, two old phones that were kept in a cupboard, and one iPad. The laptops belonged to me and Ravi’s son, who works at a software company,” she told The Indian Express.Story continues below this adShe said the search was recorded by a member of the police team. The officials also asked them to sign some documents before leaving around 6.40 pm.She said two FIRs are registered against Nair in Gujarat and that he had been cooperating with investigators. “However, neither his son nor I are accused in any of these cases. I don’t know why they took away our devices too,” she said.Journalist’s battles in courtOn February 10 this year, the court of Judicial Magistrate First Class in Mansa, Gandhinagar, had convicted Nair in a criminal defamation case filed by Adani Enterprises Ltd (AEL) over a series of tweets (posts on X) between October 2020 and July 2021, and some articles published on the Internet.The court had sentenced Nair to a year’s simple imprisonment and a fine of Rs 5,000, but the sentence was subsequently suspended for a month.Story continues below this adOn August 11, Justice M R Mengdey of the High Court, after hearing the submissions of lawyers for Nair and the state in relation to ‘The Washington Post’ article, rejected the journalist’s plea and contention that the FIR against him amounted to an abuse of the legal process.Nair had contended that the same complainant had already approached a court with a private complaint based on the same set of facts, which amounted to making the FIR a tool to “harass the accused”.The FIR, lodged under Sections 318(4), 336(2), 336(4) and 340(2) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita 2023 (BNS), relates to an article published in The Post on October 24, 2025. These sections deal with cheating; altering or destroying a valuable security; forgery, which is intended, or known likely, to harm the reputation of a party; and fraudulently or dishonestly using a forged document or electronic record as genuine.The FIR said that the article had alleged that the government and LIC had directed investments of large funds into Adani Group companies. Nair was also alleged to have claimed on X that Indian officials had decided to invest $3.9 billion in the Group.Story continues below this adThe allegations in the report were based on documents purportedly issued by LIC or the Department of Financial Services (DFS) under the Union Ministry of Finance.What the High Court heard and ruledThe Assistant Public Prosecutor submitted in court that LIC had denied issuing any such documents or receiving any government instructions to invest in any Adani entity.The DFS had informed the Gandhinagar Superintendent of Police that the allegations were false, baseless, and were not supported by facts, and had denied the existence of any such investment roadmap.In its eight-page oral order, the High Court observed that the existence of the documents was “under the clouds”, and prima facie appeared to be forged. The court said it would be for the “investigating agency to find out the truth as regards those documents”.Story continues below this adCounsel for Nair argued before the court that a private complaint had already been filed on April 22 this year with the same facts, and that the subsequent FIR had been intended to harass him.It was also submitted that a denial by LIC alone could not establish that the documents relied upon in the article were forged.The defence relied on precedents in Supreme Court orders to argue that an FIR that amounted to an abuse of process or was intended to harass an accused, could be quashed.However, the HC held that the earlier complaint was limited to defamation, for which the law required a private complaint, whereas the FIR concerned distinct cognizable offences.Story continues below this adThe order stated, “Merely because the Respondent No.2 has lodged a private complaint for an offence of defamation, he cannot be precluded from taking recourse to law for the alleged cognizable offence committed by the petitioner.”Holding that the FIR could not be treated as an abuse of process, the court had dismissed Nair’s petition and consequently disposed of his plea seeking a stay on the investigation.