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Tahir ‘led, instigated’ IB official’s murder: Police
This is the second charge sheet filed against Hussain in two days. He was charged by the police on Tuesday for allegedly playing a pivotal role in the riots in which 53 people were killed and over 400 injured.
Delhi Police on Wednesday filed a second charge sheet against suspended Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) councillor Tahir Hussain for incidents linked to the February riots in north-east Delhi, alleging that he “led and instigated” the murder of IB official Ankit Sharma as part of a “deep-rooted conspiracy”.
This is the second charge sheet filed against Hussain in two days. He was charged by the police on Tuesday for allegedly playing a pivotal role in the riots in which 53 people were killed and over 400 injured.
The police on Wednesday also filed a charge sheet against the principal of Shiv Vihar Rajdhani Public school for rioting outside the premises of the school during the communal rioting that started as clashes between protestors for and against the Citizenship (Amendment) Act and raged for four days
Sharma’s body, which had 51 sharp and blunt injuries, was dumped in a drain, said the police in its charge sheet, which also claims to have found an eyewitness who recorded a mob dumping the body.
Narrating the alleged sequence of events that led to Sharma’s death, the police said: “At around 5pm on February 25, the IB official had moved ahead from the crowd of Hindu people standing a few distance away from Hussain’s house to pacify the people of both sides, when around 20-25 rioters on Hussain’s instructions caught him and dragged him to Chand Bagh bridge, where they beat him to death.”
The police said one of the suspects, identified as Salman, charged in the case along with Hussain and nine others, was arrested after the police intercepted phone calls in which he spoke to relatives about the murder of a person whose body had been dumped in a drain.
Hussain’s lawyer, Javed Ali, denied the police allegations and called them a political conspiracy against his client.
“There is no direct evidence and allegations which shows that my client was involved in the crime (Ankit Sharma’s murder). In the FIR, police have stated that my client was rescued on February 24 from his house. Hence, there is no question of talking, interacting or being involved in the incident which took place on February 25,” Ali said.
In the charge sheet related to the rioting outside Shiv Vihar Rajdhani School, police charged 18 people, including school principal Faisal Farooque, who has been charged under sections dealing with rioting and criminal conspiracy, among others.
Using call data records as evidence against Farooque, police claimed that Farooque was in touch with members of the Jamia Coordination Committee (JCC), women’s group Pinjra Tod, Popular Front of India (PFI) and the Tablighi Jamaat.
Police have r arrested members of the JCC, Pinjra Tod and PFI for their alleged involvement in different incidents of violence during the riots. The groups have called the arrest of their members a “witch hunt”.
Police accused Farooque of “hatching a conspiracy to aggravate the riots” around the school. Police said the allegation was based on a statement by school security guards.
“His call detail analysis and links with prominent members of Popular Front of India, Pinjra Tod group, Jamia Coordination Committee, Hazrat Nizamuddin Markaz and some other fundamental Muslim clerics, including Deoband also show the depth of the conspiracy. In fact, it has been found that Faisal Farooque visited Deoband just one day before the riots started (February 23),” the police said in the charge sheet.
Markaz is the headquarters of the Talblighi Jamaat, an Islamic missionary group.
Police also attached photographs of a large catapult they found on the terrace of the school. Police said the catapult was used to launch throw bricks, acids, stones and molotov cocktails and added that the rioters had camped inside and fired bullets from the terrace of Shiv Vihar Rajdhani School. The police also attached photographs of a rope that was tied to the terrace of the school to the adjacent DRP Convent Public School, which was used by rioters to climb down to the convent school and set it on fire.
Farooque’s counsel Shams Khwaja denied the police allegations and said both schools had filed police complaints of arson. “My client promptly reported the arson to police control room repeatedly as per police record and also to the fire brigade. No one came to help. His complaint precedes the neighbouring school’s and yet his FIR was registered only after the neighbouring school’s complaint.”
Khwaja added that the FIR filed by the DRP convent school did not name Farooque as a rioter. “My client wasn’t named in the FIR by the neighbouring school at all. He was arrested on the basis of sham witnesses set up by the police. Talking to ulemas of Deoband is no crime. That institution has a history of pioneering the freedom movement for our Independence. How could talking to them be construed as a problem?”
He also said joining anti-CAA protests or being a member of the Pinjra Tod or JCC were not crimes. “But even so my client was not involved in these protests. Unless they can show conversations with these people where my client is instigating or planning violence, he cannot be implicated.”
On reports that Farooque was in touch with senior members of the Tablighi Jamaat, a school administrator who asked not to be named, said, “Tablighi Jamaat wasn’t involved in riots and their name only came up during the Covid-19 incident. How is the police linking these two? We didn’t have the time to participate in anti-CAA protests and sit on the roads because January and February is the time we usually prepare for the upcoming board exams.”
Markaz, the headquarters of the Tablighi Jamaat in Nizamuddin Basti, was sealed after the emergence of a large cluster of Covid-19 cases on its premises following a large religious congregation in March.
