Today, unknown assailants entered the residence of former Hindu Mahasabha leader Kamlesh Tiwari with a gun and knife concealed in sweet boxes, shot bullets at him and slit his throat, killing him. While Islamists celebrated the Hindu leader’s murder and citizens mourned the death and posed tough questions to the government, some media houses reported that the ISIS angle and the bounty hunter angle has been ruled out as possible motives for the murder of Kamlesh Tiwari.
Times Now reported that the Uttar Pradesh Chief Secretary of Home Ministry had confirmed that both ISIS terror angle and bounty hunting angles were ruled out as possible motives for the brutal murder of Kamlesh Tiwari.
#Breaking | U.P Additional Chief Secy (Home) confirms both ISIS terror angle & bounty hunting ruled out in Kamlesh Tiwari murder case. pic.twitter.com/b3GbjnWHFd
— TIMES NOW (@TimesNow) October 18, 2019
Some other journalists too reported the same:
UP Additional Chief Secy (Home) confirms both ISIS terror angle & bounty hunting ruled out in Kamlesh Tiwari murder. Police probing the case only on personal enmity angle.
— Piyush Rai (@Benarasiyaa) October 18, 2019
However, a Times of India journalist who regularly reports crimes from Uttar Pradesh tweeted that this news was incorrect. He quoted a top intelligence officer saying that it was too soon to rule out any angle and all possible motives are being probed.
Top Intelligence and police officials have confirmed that no angle has been ruled out in the #KamleshTiwari case. “All angles are being probed. Too early to comment.. Give us some time,” a top officer said just now. Plz avoid conjectures.
— Raj Shekhar Jha (@rajshekharTOI) October 18, 2019
Kamlesh Tiwari had complained about threats to his life from ISIS in 2018. A video has surfaced showing the former leader of the Hindu Mahasabha alleging that the Yogi Adityanath government in Uttar Pradesh and the Centre were not taking threats against him seriously and did not wish to provide him security because he was not politically aligned with them.
Tiwari had cited a newspaper report in which it was mentioned that the charge sheet filed by the Anti-Terrorism Squad (ATS) in an Ankleshwar court said that one of the ISIS operatives arrested from Gujarat had once showed a video featuring Kamlesh Tiwari to witnesses and said: “Kamlesh Tiwari ko maar daalna hai.”
There were other threats made against Kamlesh Tiwari as well. Anwarul Haq, the West UP general secretary of Jamiat Shababul Islam, a Muslim organisation, announced a Rs 51 lakh reward for “anyone who brings the head of Kamlesh Tiwari”.
All India Imams Council (AIIC) state president Maulana Zulfi in Meerut had stated tha Tiwari has crossed all limits and the government should award him a death sentence.
The hundreds of students in Darul Uloom Deoband had joined the protests too. Highways were blocked, buses were burnt and despite Kamlesh’s arrest, the riots continued. They wanted his head.
Swarajya journalist Swati Goel Sharmaa pointed out that such spins and misinterpretation of police statements by the media is nothing new, especially when Hindu leaders are killed.
Exactly what @ghazalimohammad did in case of gaurakshak Gopal’s killing. And never corrected it even after I pointed out.
Police still hasnt made any arrest in case pic.twitter.com/F6S54rNGvr— Swati Goel Sharma (@swati_gs) October 18, 2019
When Gaurakshak Gopal was murdered, NDTV had reported that the police had said that there is no angle of cow-smuggling in the case, however, that was not the truth since no arrest has been made even to this day.
Read: They were discussing the marriage of a Muslim girl to a Hindu boy: Kamlesh Tiwari’s domestic help
While several usual suspects have been trying to downplay the brutal murder, the investigation is still ongoing and no conclusive proof of the motive or the perpetrators have emerged yet.
