At a time when the healthcare workers, policemen are risking their lives to limit the spread of the Chinese epidemic, there have been concerted attacks against them, led by Muslim mobs. The attacks on the frontline workers by Muslim mobs have continued ever since the reports that Tablighi Jamaat is the primary sources of transmission of coronavirus in the country emerged.
In addition to the nuisance created by Muslim mobs, the Tablighi Jamaat members, who have emerged as the sole reason for the sudden spike in the number of coronavirus cases in India, are turning out to be quite a headache for the authorities. The anti-social behaviour of attendees of Tablighi Jamaat has left the authorities and medical teams completely distraught.
From attacking medical teams who were searching for Tablighi members for who had attended the religious congregation to check them for possible infection, to spiting on doctors at Isolation centres, to roaming naked in their ward and making lewd gestures for female staff, these attendees have been displaying extreme crassness.
Here are 15 incidents that have occurred in last few days where Muslim mobs had defied the lockdown rules to attack health workers and police personnel who are at the forefront of limiting the spread of Chinese pandemic COVID-19:
- On Thursday, a Muslim mob had surrounded the police and indulged stone pelting at them in Uttar Pradesh’s Aligarh after the police asked them not to offer group namaz in a mosque. Around 25 to 30 people had arrived at the mosque in Sarai Rahman area to offer prayers defying the nationwide lockdown. The mosque comes under Sarai Rahman area in Bannadevi police station area of the city.
The police soon reached the spot and had appealed to the group not to assemble outside and instead offer Namaz at their respective homes citing lockdown. However, the mob did not heed to the advice and pelted stones at them. Two police personnel were injured in the incident.
Three persons including a Muslim cleric (Maulvi) of a Mosque have been arrested in connection with attack on police personnel in Aligarh. - In Kannauj, Uttar Pradesh, a Muslim mob who had gathered to offer mass prayer (Namaz) at Jama Masjid on Friday, pelted stones at the police personnel who went there to prevent them from doing so amid the Coronavirus lockdown.
The chowki in-charge and two other police personnel have been seriously injured in the incident. They have been admitted to the district hospital. The mob also damaged the motorcycle of an LIU personnel. - A sub-Inspector and a constable of Uttar Pradesh Police were seriously injured when a police team trying to enforce the ongoing lockdown was attacked by a group of villagers in Muzaffarnagar.
The police team was on patrol in Morna village when they saw locals gathered outside in groups. When they were asked to follow the prohibitory orders, they began pelting stones at the police and some of them even attacked the cops with iron rods, said police personnel. Two policemen were injured during the attack. - In a similar incident, a Muslim mob had not only assembled at a local mosque in Mainpuri, Uttar Pradesh but also attacked the policemen for asking to avoid mass prayers (namaz) in the view of nationwide lockdown due to the coronavirus pandemic.
The Muslims had defied the rules to assemble at the mosque. On receiving information that people had gathered at the mosque located in Mohalla Mohammad Saeed town of Bhogaon, Inspector Pahup Singh reached the mosque with fellow policemen. When asked to open the door of the mosque, the mob became angry and refused to open the doors of the mosque. - On March 24, in a similar incident, a Muslim mob in Meerut created a ruckus over being stopped from offering namaz in the mosques by the city police. Scores of Muslims had hit the streets at around 5:30 PM on Sunday in Meerut following the 5-minute celebration of gratitude expressed towards the frontline workers fighting the coronavirus.
Defying the rules, they had assembled at different mosques in the town- Sisiganj, Safety Tank, Rajbandh Market, Kotwali, Lisadi Gate and Nauchandin, to offer the evening prayers. Despite repeated attempts by the police to dissuade Muslims from marching towards the mosques, many Muslims ignored police’s appeals and instead created a ruckus after police tried to impede them from assembling at mosques in the view of the surging coronavirus cases in the country. - In Indore, a medical team was attacked by a mob in Tatpatti Bakhal for visiting the locality to check on a patient with suspected coronavirus symptoms. The medical team that had gone to check on a patient with suspected coronavirus symptoms, but was attacked and pelted with stones in Indore’s Tatpatti Bhakhal.
As per reports, the gathered mob had viciously attacked the team of health workers and had even thrown stones from nearby rooftops. When the medical team sought help from the police, the police team was attacked too. The gathered mob even broke down the barricades and used the women among them as human shields when the police tried to take action. - A Facebook user named Mohammad Faisal threatened the Darbhanga District Magistrate Tyagrajan SM with death for announcing the screening for COVID-19 patients through social media. The accused offered a bounty of Rs 2 lakhs to whoever kills the DM.
In his Facebook post, the Darbhanga DM had announced that all the people who have come from outside the state will be screened. The DM also appealed people to come forward for the test. - Police personnel in Madhubani, Bihar, were fired upon when they went to search for Tablighi Jamaat attendees after Delhi’s Nizamuddin emerged as the new hotspot for the deadly Chinese virus. Three people are arrested in this regard. Reportedly, stones were pelted and bullets were fired on policemen.
A Muslim mob in Gidarganj village in Andharatharhi block of Madhubani district, Bihar pelted stones at the policemen and chased them for almost a kilometre by the unruly mob, who, in the fit of rage, also overturned a police van into a pond. - On April 1, health officials seeking contact details of coronavirus positive patients were assaulted on the suspicion that they were collecting data for CAA and NRC in Ahmednagar, Maharashtra. The health officials were simply involved in – contact tracing, the process of identification of persons who may have come into contact with an infected person and subsequent collection of further information about these contacts.
However, the Muslim residents thwacked the health officials and stopped them from tracing contacts who may have come in touch with Markas attendees and contracted the deadly contagion. - A large gathering of Muslims in Karnataka’s Hubbali district attacked police officials when they tried to stop them from offering namaaz en masse amidst the nationwide lockdown to blunt the spread of coronavirus. Four police officials, including one woman constable, were injured by Muslim youths as they pelted stones at the police personnel for stopping them from congregating amidst the looming threat of COVID-19.
In a flagrant violation of lockdown restrictions, a Muslim mob had convened at Mantur road in Hubbali to offer Friday prayers. When the district administration came to know of the mass gathering for namaaz prayers, four police personnel, including a woman constable, were dispatched to stop the mass congregation. Reportedly, a woman of the area and local youths pelted stones at the police van, injuring the four officials. - In a shocking incident, a nurse and ASHA workers were attacked by Muslim residents in Bengaluru’s Sadiq layout on Thursday for trying to carry out tests on suspected corona symptomatic patients and also for collecting information of fever and cough from the residents of the locality.
The ASHA workers had visited Sadiq Layout near Tannisandra to collect information on whether there were any patients showing symptoms of fever and cough as part of an ongoing exercise launched by the state government to ascertain the number of Corona symptomatic patients in the state to isolate them if they found to be carrying the Chinese virus.
However, some of the Muslims residents, who were seen wearing Namaz caps attacked the ASHA workers and also tore the report prepared by ASHA workers. - On Thursday, the members of the Tablighi Jamaat had misbehaved with the nurses in Ghaziabad by roaming around naked in their wards and also making lewd gestures at the female staff of a Ghaziabad hospital. The letter by the Chief Medical officer had also stated that obscene comments and songs were being heard from the ward, and inmates were asking for beedi-cigarettes from the staff of the hospital.
The occupants of the centre had attempted to spread the potential coronavirus to doctors and other medical healthcare workers who were attending to them by spitting at them. - A cluster of almost 89 Tablighi Jamaat attendees who have been quarantined in the Isolation Center at Madhu Resort in Sikandra space, Agra, had thrown quite a lot of tantrums, making it difficult for the medical staff to attend to them. These members of the Jamaat had refused to consume the healthy non-spicy food prescribed to them by the doctors, instead, they had made preposterous food demands like spicy beef biryani.
They had threatened the medical staff that if their demands are not met they would not consume medicines, nor would they allow the doctors or nurses to treat them. They have also warned that they would run away before the required 14-day isolation period. - On April 4, the Tablighi Jamaat members who are currently quarantined at Ganesh Shankar Vidyarthi Memorial Medical College in Kanpur had misbehaved with the medical staff and spat on them during their stay at the hospital in Kanpur, Uttar Pradesh. The patients had behaved rudely with the medical team and had spit inside the hospital premises. The Tablighi members used to huddle up together in the hall despite being repeatedly told not to do so.
The hospital staff have accused the attendees of the Tablighi Jamaat of breaking the rules of quarantine and defying all norms of social distancing. The staff said that the Jamaat members are making unnecessary demands to the hospital staff creating difficulties in their treatment. - Tablighi Jamaat attendees at Ahmedabad’s Sola Civil Hospital created a ruckus and refused to take medicines or injections claiming that the government wanted to kill them. 26 Tablighi Jamaat attendees, who were kept in the isolation ward, accused that they were being held against their will and gathered around in a corner.
The Islamic congregation such as ‘Tablighi Jamaat’ has turned out to be the epicentre of the Chinese coronavirus spread in the country. As per conservative estimates, the congregation organised by Tablighi Jamaat was attended by more than 2000 people, both from various parts of the country as well as from abroad. Several people who attended the congregation had turned positive for COVID-19, and few of them have died.
