Days after Jharkhand Police dropped murder charge against all 13 accused in the lynching case of a young Muslim man, Tabrez Ansari, our Union Minister of Minority Affairs, Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi, on Wednesday, 11 September, shrugged off responsibilities saying “he has not seen the news yet.”
When a reporter from Times Now asked Naqvi about the dropping of murder charge, he said, “I haven’t seen the news.” When the reporter pressed him to address the issue, he refused to make any more comments on the matter.
Resorting to denials when it comes to communal mob lynchings is not new for Naqvi.
‘Lynchings Should Not be Given Communal or Political Colour’
Commenting on the Tabrez Ansari case earlier in June, Naqvi had said incidents of lynching should not be given a communal colour or be politicised.
“Lynching is a criminal subject. It should not be give a communal colour. It is highly condemnable and no one should politicise it,” the Minority Affairs Minister said on 29 June.
‘Most Lynching Cases Are Fabricated’
On 21 July, speaking to India Today, Naqvi had reportedly said that most lynching cases are concocted.
This was in response to India Today’s question on Samajwadi Party leader Azam Khan’s statement of Muslims “serving a sentence” after the Partition.
Khan had said, “If Muslims went to Pakistan, they would not get this punishment. Why our ancestors did not go to Pakistan? They regarded India as their own country. Now they will be punished and they will have to endure,” adding that the Muslims of this country had been living a very “disgusting life”.
‘The Incident Never Happened’: Naqvi on Pehlu Khan Lynching Case
After Pehlu Khan, a Muslim cattle trader, was lynched by a mob in Rajasthan’s Alwar in broad daylight in 2017, Naqvi had said in Parliament, “No such incident, as being reported, has taken place on the ground.”
Vasundhara Raje-led BJP government was at the helm in Rajasthan during the incident.
However, after much outrage, a day later he admitted the mob violence and said in Rajya Sabha, “This is a very sensitive issue. Rajasthan government is taking strongest possible steps.... Those who committed, they are hooligans. Don't see them as Hindus or Muslims.”
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