A Twitter user named Tehseen Poonawala, who is the brother-in-law of the most famous brother-in-law of the country, Robert Vadra, got himself in a tight spot on Twitter yesterday after claiming that his driver was “lynched” by a mob.
Apart from Twitter, Tehseen is also seen on TV defending Congress in news debates while posing as a “political analyst”. Recently, the newest narrative being peddled in the country, and backed by the Congress party, is about India becoming ‘Lynchistan‘. Tehseen’s tweet appeared as another “data point” to prove that India was indeed becoming Lynchistan.
It all started, when the brother-in-law of Robert Vadra tweeted this:
Guys terrible news. My driver was lynched by a mob … today was his day off. My driver coming to meet me now. @CPDelhi @dtptraffic 1n
— Tehseen Poonawalla (@tehseenp) July 2, 2017
Going by the classical definition, lynching means that ‘someone is killed by a mob without a trial’ but Tehseen’s own tweet admitted that the driver was not killed.
Tehseen then claimed that even though he didn’t know the details or the reasons for the incident, he did know that his it was a case of ‘mob lynching’. Not only that, he somehow even thought that religion of the driver was relevant to the case:
I will refrain from judgements now. I know it is mob lynching. I do NOT know the reason or details. Hv spoken to my doc next bldg. Priority
— Tehseen Poonawalla (@tehseenp) July 2, 2017
When the Delhi police on twitter promptly reached out to him, he pompously asked them to serve him as soon as possible:
Ask the local police sho Hauz Khas or concerned office on duty to call me asap. My secretary farz is on 9594283135. He is with me .
— Tehseen Poonawalla (@tehseenp) July 2, 2017
He was soon widely condemned for his sense of entitlement (asking police to call him instead of other way round), which also betrayed how much really concerned he was for his driver:
Isne 140 button dabaye ye tweet likhne ke liye, lekin 100 number dial karne ke liye 4 button na daba paaya. https://t.co/q6IRlgiH5E
— Gabbbar (@GabbbarSingh) July 2, 2017
Jeeja ka Jeeja ka itna entitlement toh banta hai yaar. pic.twitter.com/ALfNl9ePo5
— FarraGau CowFefe (@YearOfRat) July 2, 2017
Wow. What a sense of entitlement… Boy it’s not your in-laws’ in-laws rule anymore. Go to the police station to file FIR like everyone else https://t.co/PaTNtLcHHD
— Rohit Agarwal (@ragarwal) July 2, 2017
He later tweeted out his claims about what transpired between the alleged mob and his driver. According to him, his driver was walking to his home when a few youngsters asked him for money to buy alcohol. The driver refused, after which he was allegedly assaulted and his shirt torn. A woman came to his aid but she too was allegedly assaulted. He even claimed that the police was a bit reluctant to register the case.
However, Delhi police has contested his claims. According to a DNA report, police denied any mob lynching (obviously, as no one died) or even organised mob violence. The police said that the whole affair was about a fight between Tehseen’s driver Sharda Prasad and a 19-year-old boy named Rohit, where both abused and assaulted each other, though no major injuries were inflicted on the driver. Police has booked both of them for the assault.
So in all probability, a member of the most powerful political family of India made wrong and exaggerated claims about ‘lynching’ and ‘mob violence’ when it was a petty fight between two individuals. Whether it was borne out of genuine lack of information and knowledge, or borne out of ill-will to spread panic about ‘Lynchistan’ is left for readers to conclude, but the police has termed Tehseen’s allegations as “ill-founded and not-based on facts”.
This isn’t the only time Tehseen has found himself in the middle of a self-created controversy. In February this year, Smriti Irani had revealed on a TV nenws channel how he had sent an obscene tweet to her. Tehseen proceeded to delete the tweet and made ridiculously false claims that he never sent any.
