In some shocking news coming out of Meerut in Uttar Pradesh, a large mob on Monday decided to attack a local police station after the Eid prayers. According to reports, the mob took advantage over the fact that there was low police presence at the Parakshitgarh police due to their deployment around the city during the festival.
Initially the large crowd assembled in front of the police station and started sloganeering. They later took it up a notch and started pelting stones. This really blew up soon as some elements in the crowd started to fire bullets and even tried to burn down the police station. The police somehow managed to take control of the situation and chased away the crowd. This has reportedly resulted in injuries to a dozen people including policemen. A few policemen were also reportedly beaten up by the mob and their uniform too was torn.
The whole issue reportedly began when a certain Amitabh Abbasi was murdered a couple of days back and his body was thrown into a jungle near his village. Amitabh reportedly went missing on Saturday evening and his body was found by villagers later. Amitabh was a resident of Dak Pir Khajuri Street in Parakshitgarh. His relatives then lodged a complaint against Wasim and Nadeem, accusing them of the murder. Wasim was then arrested by the police.
The aides of the accused though weren’t happy about it and after offering the Eid namaz, reached the police station to demand that they be freed. During the whole exchange the mob went berserk and started vandalising the furniture present in the police station and the issue kept escalating and culminated in an arson attempt. The police now seems to have taken 6 people into custody and is tracking down the rest. The police has also deployed a large force in the area to control the situation.
The efforts of Waseem’s aides to get him off the hook in the murder case may be futile as he already seems to have confessed to have committed the crime during questioning. According to the report, Waseem and Amitabh were in a same-sex relationship and Wasim was pressurising Amitabh to leave his family. Amitabh didn’t agree to it and an enraged Waseem proceeded to murder him. A local media report though claims a conflicting motive of the crowd. It claims that it was actually the deceased’s aides who reached the police station to demand the arrest of a certain Naresh, who they claimed had hatched the whole conspiracy.
But what all reports agree that the very violent crowd started vandalism, threw stones, fired shots and even tried to burn down the police station.
What is more worrying is the fact that a few religious leaders in the city have also been making inflammatory statements that might further spur such crowds to take law into their own hands. According to a report, the Qazi of Meerut in a meeting after spotting the Eid moon, stated that people shouldn’t be afraid of either Modi or Yogi but should only be afraid of Allah. He also claimed that atrocities were being heaped on Muslims and if they continued, the government would cease to exist.
