All India Majlis-e-Ittehad-ul-Muslimeen (AIMIM) leader Mofakkerul Islam was arrested at the Bagdogra airport on Friday after he was named the main conspirator behind the April 1 violence at Mothabari in West Bengal’s Malda during protests against voter deletions as part of the electoral roll Special Intensive Revision (SIR).
Videos posted on social media purportedly showed Islam making an incendiary speech on Wednesday when a mob held eight judicial officers involved in the SIR hostage for over eight hours and attacked their vehicles. A second accused, Akramul Bagani, was arrested for allegedly uploading incendiary videos on YouTube.
In one of the videos, the authenticity of which HT could not verify, Islam could be heard saying they do not have the responsibility to maintain communal harmony. In another video, he purportedly said, “We will disperse only if the district magistrate and the police superintendent come and tell us that our names have been included in the voter list.”
Additional director general of police K Jayaraman said Islam is a resident of Itahar and registered as a voter in the Raiganj assembly constituency. “He is an AIMIM leader and apparently a lawyer as well. The Criminal Investigation Department (CID) was tracking him and some other suspects after the Mothabari incident. The CID detained him at Bagdogra airport and informed us. He was trying to fly to Bengaluru,” said Jayaraman.
He added that 35 people have so far been arrested in the case since Wednesday. “We have registered 19 cases throughout Malda. Islam is named in three such cases.” He said Islam was on his way from Kolkata when he stopped at Murshidabad and made speeches before arriving in Malda. “We will not allow any unlawful activity anymore.”
{{/usCountry}}He added that 35 people have so far been arrested in the case since Wednesday. “We have registered 19 cases throughout Malda. Islam is named in three such cases.” He said Islam was on his way from Kolkata when he stopped at Murshidabad and made speeches before arriving in Malda. “We will not allow any unlawful activity anymore.”
{{/usCountry}}He referred to the allegations of delay in rescuing the judicial officers and said they had sufficient security cover but could not use force because of the presence of women and children among the protesters. “We are investigating the cause of the delay.”
On Thursday, the ECI directed the National Investigation Agency (NIA) to take over the investigation into the violence from the police. Jayaraman said that the NIA had not contacted them so far.
Chief minister Mamata Banerjee said Islam’s arrest exposed the conspiracy behind the Malda violence. “The Election Commission of India transferred 483 of our officers and posted new people. But our CID tracked down the main conspirator. We have long maintained that AIMIM and the BJP [Bharatiya Janata Party] are trying to create disturbances in Bengal. The Congress and the Left are involved too. But common people will give a befitting reply to all of them,” Banerjee said at an election rally in North Dinajpur.
Lok Sabha member Asaduddin Owaisi-led AIMIM has so far named 12 candidates for the April 23-29 polls in West Bengal in alliance with Humayun Kabir’s Janata Unnayan Party (JUP). The ruling Trinamool Congress suspended Kabir after he laid the foundation stone of a mosque modelled on Ayodhya’s Babri Masjid in Murshidabad in December
Banerjee, who campaigned in parts of Muslim-majority Murshidabad and Malda on Thursday, alleged that most of those deleted from the voter roll are Muslims.
There were fresh protests against the voter deletions on Thursday. Maulana Muhammad Shahjahan Ali Qadri, the Indian Secular Front candidate from Mothabari, was arrested along with 17 others, including his two sons, on Thursday on charges of disturbing peace, obstructing government staff from discharging duty, destroying public property, etc.