Samajwadi Party (SP) leader Umed Pahalwan Idris, who appeared in a Facebook Live video alongside Ghaziabad assault victim Abdul Samad, had been booked by Ghaziabad police on June 17 for giving the incident of personal animosity a “communal colour”. The SP leader who reportedly made the victim of assault tell that he was forced to chant Jai Shri Ram, has now taken a complete U-turn.
While speaking to journalist Aman Chopra on Zee News show Taal Thok Ke, the SP leader said that he was not aware that there was no religious angle in the incident. He further denied knowing anything about the ‘tabeez’ (occult amulet), for which one Bauna Saddam had hired the services of occultist Abdul Samad Saifi. He also declined of being aware that Abdul Samad was attacked by a group of people that included Muslims too.
When Aman Chopra asked the SP leader why he lied about the victim being made to chant and unnecessarily introduced the ‘Jai Shri Ram’ angle to give a communal twist to the incident and was he asked by his party to do so, Umed Pahalwan seems to get agitated.
The cornered SP leader immediately brought out the victim card to claim that he is being targeted since he wears a skullcap and has a beard. He furthered that he did not lie, it was the victim who claimed that he was made to chant ‘Jai Shri Ram’.
When the Zee News anchor reiterated about him knowing that the victim was attacked by Muslim assailants too, he first refuses, then went on to defend them by saying: “Musalmano ne toh mara hi nahi, yeh baat sabit hi nahi hui” (Muslims did not attack the victim, nothing has been proved against them yet). Umed Idris asserted that he did not know that there were Muslims also amongst the assailants.
Interestingly, when the Samajwadi leader did a Facebook Live video on June 7 alongside Ghaziabad assault victim Abdul Samad, he castigated Hindus for beating up the elderly victim, chopping off his beard and forcing him to chant Jai Shri Ram slogans.
Umed Pahalwan Idris, who was seen doing most of the talking on behalf of the victim, gave the incident a communal spin by claiming that Hindus attacked Samad. Using extremely abusive and crass language, the SP leader had issued open threats to Hindus who he claimed had attacked Abdul Samad.
Facebook live video by Umed Idris used by ‘liberals’ to communalise a petty fight to defame ‘Jai Shri Ram’
This Facebook live had got the ball rolling for the so-called secular liberals who lapped up the video to peddle their favourite ‘Dara Hua Musalman’ narrative. The left-leaning brigade rushed to communalise the incident of personal animosity to defame the ‘Jai Shri Ram’ chant whch is held sacred by Hindus.
On June 14, Alt News co-founder Muhammed Zubair first uploaded a muted video (which now stands deleted) of the incident where the victim was being assaulted and Tweeted that the man was threatened at gunpoint, beaten, assaulted and the perpetrators forcefully chopped off his beard.
Soon after, Zubair posted (now deleted) the Facebook live video done by SP leader Idrisi with photos of SP leader Akhilesh Yadav hanging on the wall.
These two videos activated the entire left lobby giving the incident a ‘communal color’ after almost 10 days of the assault. Publications like The Wire, TheQuint, Indian Express published reports on the basis of the victim’s statement in the Facebook live video, thereby, defaming the Hindu religious slogan ‘Jai Shri Ram.’
The video and the narrative soon went viral on social media, posing a threat to the law and order in the state.
Ghaziabad police busts the fake ‘hate crime’ angle
On the very same day, Ghaziabad police uploaded a video apprising of the case giving relevant details and kept the social media users updated with the development thereon.
Taking cognizance of the matter, the Uttar Pradesh government filed an FIR on June 15 against Twitter for failing to flag the video with unverified claims as ‘manipulative’ and lack of action.
Alt News co-founder Zubair, Rana Ayyub, The Wire, Salman Nizami, Maksoor Usmani, Sama Mohammad and Saba Naqvi have also been booked for spreading misleading and fake news.
SSP Amit Pathak in a press conference held on June 16 informed that some social media handles and media publications turned the entire incident of assault on an old man into a hate crime and deliberately tried to give it a communal colour.
The SSP stated that while the accused and the victim were known to each other, false claims on social media had fanned a communal narrative, hinting that it was a crime committed solely for communal hatred.
SP leader Umed Idris coerced victim into filing a police complaint and added the ‘Jai Shri Ram’ angle
It was reported that the incident took place on June 5, but Abdul Samad did not file a police complaint against his attackers. It was the Samajwadi Party leader Umed Pahalwan Idris who coerced Abdul Samad into filing a police complaint.
Idrisi claimed that the victim wrote the first complaint on June 6 but police did not lodge an FIR on that day. He said that only after he went live on Facebook and spoke about the attack, that the police filed an FIR at 7.44 pm on June 7.
Victim’s initial complaint found factually wrong
Meanwhile, when asked about the June 6 complaint and why the police didn’t lodge an FIR that same day, Akhilesh Mishra, the Loni police station head, rejected Idrisi’s claim. “The June 6 complaint is forged. We never received any complaint on that day and it does not even have the police stamp on it. Only on the basis of the June 7 complaint, we lodged the FIR.”
The police informed that the FIR filed on June 07 mentioned that the accused and location both were unknown to the victim, however, the investigations have revealed otherwise.
Basically, so far, the police investigation has revealed that in the initial FIR, a petty crime due to the personal animosity of two parties was given a different colour. As per reports, the victim Samad was reluctant to file the FIR and has been uncooperative in the police investigation.
The claim of ‘forced to chant Jai Shri Ram’ was first found in the SP leader’s video. After which the police had filed an FIR. But the victim had made no mention of the ‘Jai Shri Ram’ chant in the initial FIR too.
UP Police has booked the SP leader Umed Idris for spreading false information to incite communal hatred.
