Islamist Majid Freeman, infamous for fanning the anti-Hindu violence in the United Kingdom’s Leicester earlier last year, on Monday, April 24, took to Twitter to share a video of miscreants assaulting an elderly Muslim man and shaving his beard off.
Freeman, a fundamentalist and an Islamic supremacist at heart, claimed that the incident took place in India’s Uttar Pradesh, where a ‘Hindutva’ mob lynched an elderly man and subjected him to a brutal attack before cutting his beard off with scissors. “This everyday cowardly Hindutva extremism against Muslims & minorities needs to be stopped,” he tweeted.
A cursory glance at the video reveals that the incident is of the 2021 Ghaziabad fake hate crime, a video of which had gone viral on social media that year after Alt News co-founder Mohammed Zubair manipulated a muted version of the same, claiming that the elderly Muslim man was subjected to assault after he refused to chant ‘Jai Shri Ram’.
After being called out over the fake video, Freeman doubled down on his twisted narrative, claiming that though the video is from June 2021, the further details are even more horrifying.
Ghaziabad fake hate crime: How Mohammed Zubair, Saba Naqvi, and others gave communal colour to a petty quarrel
On 14 June 2021, Alt News co-founder Mohammed Zubair took to Twitter to claim that an elderly Muslim man, Abdul Samad Saifi, in Ghaziabad was assaulted and forced to chant ‘Jai Shri Ram’. The incident took place in Loni in Ghaziabad in Uttar Pradesh.
Zubair tweeted, “An elderly man, Sufi Abdul Samad Saifi was attacked by five goons in Loni, Ghaziabad. He was threatened at the gunpoint, beaten, assaulted, and they forcefully chopped off his beard.” In a video shared by the ‘fact-checker, the victim could be seen being thrashed with sticks by the culprit. His beard was also cut forcibly using a scissor.
However, the police promptly punctured the claims made by Zubair and his supporters. In a tweet, Ghaziabad police informed that three accused had been arrested in the case. According to the police, the incident took place about 10 days ago on June 5, 2021. The victim Abdul Samad Saifi had travelled to the Loni border from Bulandshahr, where he was escorted to the house of accused Parvesh Gujjar in Banthala in Loni. After some time, the co-accused, namely, Kallu, Poli, Arif, and Adil aka Mushahid arrived at Parvez’s house and began thrashing the victim.
थाना लोनी बार्डर क्षेत्रान्तर्गत हुई घटना में #GhaziabadPolice द्वारा की गई कठोर कार्यवाही- 3 अभियुक्त गिरफ्तार@Uppolice pic.twitter.com/zg6lHregKD
— POLICE COMMISSIONERATE GHAZIABAD (@ghaziabadpolice) June 14, 2021
The victim Saifi sold amulets for a living. According to the police, the accused were miffed after the amulet proved harmful to them. Unlike what Zubair had alleged, the police said that the elderly man knew the culprits for a long time. Reportedly, Saifi had sold his amulets to several people in the village through the accused. The police had initially arrested Parvez while Adil and Kallu were nabbed on Monday (June 14). A case was registered against them under relevant sections of the Indian Penal Code (IPC).
In his confession, Parvez admitted to hitting Abdul Saifi, stating that he was angry as he felt that the tabeez (occult amulet) given to him by Saifi had backfired and he lost his unborn child because of it. However, several propagandists, including Saba Naqvi, Rana Ayyub, and Alt News’ Mohammed Zubair, etc. gave a communal spin to the incident, alleging that Saifi was assaulted for his refusal to chant ‘Jai Shri Ram’.
Nevertheless, Majid sharing the video and later, brazening out his stance, demonstrates how propaganda peddled by the likes of Mohammed Zubair, who was later involved in dog-whistling Islamists against former BJP leader Nupur Sharma and mobilising the Sar Tan Se Juda gang, is lapped up by his ideological brethren halfway around the world in their collective attempt to propagate Hinduphobia.
How Majid Freeman consistently peddled lies to instigate attacks against Hindus during Leicester violence
In August 2022, Leicester was convulsed with riots after Muslim mobs went on a rampage against the Hindu community. Violence erupted after a spate of targeted attacks on Hindus followed the Asia Cup India-Pakistan cricket match on August 28, when armed Islamists attacked Hindus and their residences in the vicinity.
Hundreds of Hindus had taken to the streets of Leicester to protest against the earlier violence by Muslims against Hindus in the area. During the protest by Hindus, the Muslim mob started indiscriminately attacking Hindus with stones and glass bottles. The protest by Hindus was disrupted by Islamists as they hurled glass bottles at the protestors. A Saffron flag was also desecrated by a mob of Islamists in front of the police.
Majid Freeman was one among the Islamists at the forefront of instigating the violence against Hindus. Freeman, a local Leicester Muslim “activist” who is known to harbour problematic and extremist Islamic views, spearheaded a fake news campaign during the Leicester violence to instigate the Islamists to continue attacking Hindus.
Majid lied about Quran being desecrated in Leicester, insinuating that the Hindus had committed this act. However, OpIndia tried to verify these claims. There is one video about this supposed Quran desecration where 2 men and 1 woman are seen collecting torn pages of the Quran from the street. There is no video evidence of the Quran being desecrated. Moreover, there has been no complaint filed by the police and no video evidence submitted for investigation either.
There was another incident that was cited by Majid Freeman to claim that Hindus had been attacking Muslims. He claimed that a mob of 30+ Hindus had chased and assaulted a Muslim teenager. When confirmed, it turned out that while the Muslim organisations had claimed this, no video evidence was submitted to the police and no investigation was underway, OpIndia was told by Insight UK.
On the 4th of September, when the violence against Hindus started with mobs hunting them down in their houses and on the streets, Majid Freeman took to Twitter to dog-whistle against Hindus again.
From the 4th to the 7th of September, Muslim mobs went on a rampage against Hindus. On the 4th of September, when Majid tweeted and dog-whistled, the Muslim mob went on a rampage unprovoked while the Hindus were celebrating Ganesh Chaturthi. Eggs were thrown when Hindu symbols were spotted and where Ganesh puja was being held. A Hindu man was dragged out of his home and stabbed when his aunt ran out of the house to defend him, she was injured because the Muslim mob punched and beat her.
On the 8th of September, he repeated the lie that a Muslim boy was attacked by 30+ Hindus, and his evidence to back that claim was an unverifiable video and the fact that he wanted people to trust his word. As mentioned before, there is no investigation into this because there was no evidence provided.
Even after the violence that was perpetrated on the 4, 5, 6 and 7th of September, Majid continued to lie. He claimed on the 9th of September that a Muslim boy was held by Hindus and asked for his religion. When they found out he was a Muslim, they tried to beat him, however, the Muslim boy managed to escape after beating the Hindus up. The Leicester police responded to Majid saying that such an incident had not happened.
