A year and 908 convictions later, Nizamuddin Markaz reopens with strict Covid protocols

Every evening since Sunday, a representative of the Nizamuddin Markaz diligently visits the Hazrat Nizamuddin police station with a list of 50 names and their accompanying identity papers

Every evening since Sunday, a representative of the Nizamuddin Markaz diligently visits the Hazrat Nizamuddin police station with a list of 50 names and their accompanying identity papers. These 50 are the only men allowed to enter and pray inside the building during Shab-e-Barat this year, as part of a March 24 Delhi high court order, which allowed the conditional reopening of the Markaz, almost a year after it emerged as a Covid-19 hot spot and had to be sealed.

The Delhi government had declared the Markaz one of Delhi’s first hot spots of Covid-19.(Sanjeev Verma/HT PHOTO)

Until the building was sealed last year on April 1, it housed around 2,500 people, including foreigners, belonging mainly to the Tablighi Jamaat — a transnational Sunni Islamic missionary movement.

A management official of the Markaz building, who asked not to be named, said, “Earlier, we would give the police the names and details of only foreigners who came to the Markaz. This was the standard practice. But now, we do it for everyone. After months of approaching various courts, we got permission to reopen on March 28. Looking back at what happened here last year, we can say that the Markaz attendees were in the right place at the wrong time,”

The Delhi government had declared the Markaz one of Delhi’s first hot spots of Covid-19, prompting Nizamuddin basti and other nearby areas to be sealed and contained to prevent the spread of the virus. The evacuation of Tablighi Jamaat attendees ended on April 1, 2020, after a 36-hour evacuation drive, during which 2,358 people were shifted to quarantine centres and hospitals across the city.

Records seen by HT show that as part of the contact tracing of Markaz visitors, police analysed 2,850 cellphone numbers of people who were inside the Markaz, or had come in touch with those inside the building, and tracked down 39,300 people using call records. Of these, police teams on the ground got in touch with at least 25,050 people.

Delhi Police officers call it the “biggest contact tracing exercise” till date for the city.

After the building was identified as a hot spot, the Union government had in April last year said the infection in places outside Delhi — such as Telangana, Mumbai and Andaman Islands — were also linked to people who had visited the Markaz. In mid-April last year, at least 1,000 of the 1,578 Covid-19 cases in Delhi at the time, were related to the congregation inside the building, Delhi government data showed.

THE INVESTIGATION

As part of the investigation, the Delhi Police’s crime team had on March 31 filed an FIR under the Epidemic Diseases Act, the Disaster Management Act and under sections of the Indian Penal Code, which included those of culpable homicide not amounting to murder and criminal conspiracy. The people named in FIRs as on March 31 included Tablighi Jamaat chief Maulana Saad, and six other top officials of the religious sect,for defying a series of government directives, which curbed religious and large gatherings to contain the spread of Covid-19 in the national capital.

Records seen by HT show that the Delhi Police charged 952 foreigners from 36 countries. The crime branch registered the FIR on March 31. Police and court records show that while 908 foreigners entered a plea bargain and pled guilty to the charges, 44 people chose to face trial and contest the charges, and were later acquitted. HT spoke to several officers in the crime branch who confirmed that Maulana Saad has not been charged in any of the charge sheets till date.

Delhi Police spokesperson, Chinmoy Biswal, said, “On the acquittal of the 44 people, we are going to appeal in a higher court. The police’s case has resulted in the conviction of 908 people. The cases were presented in court and they were convicted. We do not want to name any individuals because =we are still investigating the case.”

A Tablighi Jamaat attendee from Indonesia, who refused to be identified, on a phone call said, “Had we stayed on in India, even we would have been acquitted. But we had a difficult choice to make. We could either wait several months for the trial to get over or enter into a plea bargain, serve a minor sentence, and return home. We had already spent 100 days in the quarantine centre and wanted to go back home. The allegation that Tablighi Jamaat attendees deliberately spread the infection is wrong.”

All those who pled guilty and were convicted by the courts were not sent to prison. The courts said that the attendees had already served their sentences during their stay in the quarantine facilities.

Shahid Ali, a spokesperson of the Markaz, who is also a lawyer, said, “It was a political conspiracy by the Delhi government. The Delhi government misused its power and wrote to the L-G to file an FIR against Markaz. This is how everything started.Police had no evidence against Maulana Saad and others in the first place because of which, he was never charged. Even those people evacuated from the building were the ones trapped inside because a nationwide lockdown was imposed suddenly and everything closed down in Delhi. But we do not want to dwell in the past. We are glad that the Markaz is finally open again. Tablighi Jamaat is not a political organisation. People who were charged have been acquitted, while foreigners who were living away from their families entered a plea bargain and have returned to their families back home. We hold no grudges against anyone.”

Delhi government spokespersons did not respond to requests for a comment on the matter.