Triple talaq victim Nida Khan, family attacked; accuses husband, Bareilly cleric
Nida said around 20-25 persons had barged into her residence and attacked her family. They had raised slogans in the names of my husband and my father-in-law, she said.
Nida Khan (23) has accused her husband and in-laws, the famous Ala Hazrat family, and 20-25 others of attacking her and her family at their residence in Shehdana area of Bareilly on Thursday evening.
Sheeran Raza had divorced Nida through triple talaq in 2016, which she has refused to acknowledge and appealed against in court.
“The attack was to prevent me from pursuing the triple talaq case against my in-laws,” Nida said after meeting district magistrate Pinki Jowel on Friday. The DM has asked the local police to look into the matter.
According to the complaint, she was with her parents, Mussarat Yar Khan and Yasmin Khan and brother Moin Khan at around 5 pm on Thursday when around 20-25 people barged into their first floor residence and manhandled her family members.
“They manhandled my parents and pulled me by my hand in an attempt to drag me outside,” she said in the complaint, adding that they also had a bottle of acid using which they threatened to disfigure her.
“The attackers raised slogans in the names of my husband and my father-in-law, and claimed to be their followers,” she alleged, and named Sheeran and his father Usman Raza Khan, a cleric who looks after the Ala Hazrat Dargah, the most revered shrine of the Barelvi sect of Sunni Islam, among the accused.
Khan has refuted the allegations, saying he had nothing to do with the attack. “We have our differences but she is still like a daughter to me and I condemn any physical attack on her.”
The police was informed of the attack, but the attackers fled before they arrived.
“We have registered the compliant of the family and a team from Baradari police station is investigating the matter,” said senior superintendent of police Joginder Singh, adding that an FIR will also be registered against the accused.
Nida was married to Sheeran, elder son of Khan, a cleric and descendent of Islamic scholar Ala Hazrat in 2015, but was divorced through triple talaq—a provision by which a Muslim man can divorce his wife by pronouncing the word talaq thrice—in March 2016.
Nida has refused to acknowledge the divorce and filed a complaint against her in-laws based on which an FIR was lodged under sections 313 (causing miscarriage without woman’s consent), 323 (voluntarily causing hurt), 452 (house trespass after preparation for hurt, assault or wrongful restraint), 506 (criminal intimidation) and other sections of IPC against her husband and in-laws.
She has also appealed the court against the divorce. Nida currently lives with her parents and assists other victims of triple talaq.
