Journalist Rana Ayyub has been booked by the Ghaziabad police on charges of money-laundering and misappropriating donations meant for Covid patients and flood victims in some eastern states.

Other charges that journalist Ayyub faces are criminal breach of trust and cheating by using computer resources under the Information Technology Act.

The FIR was lodged on Tuesday on the complaint of Vikas Pandey, founder of an NGO, Hindu IT Cell.

The police will take further legal action against the journalist only after investigating the case and finding evidence against her, Ghaziabad superintendent of police Gyanendra Singh said.

Ayyub's name also figured in a recent case of circulation of a video in which a 72-year-old Bulandshahr resident had accused four men of beating him up and chopping his beard to force him to chant Jai Shri Ram.

The Ghaziabad police, however, later found that the communal allegations made by the elderly man were false and he had made them on the instigation of a Samajwadi Party worker.