By BETWA SHARMA / Article14
Prayagraj: In May 2021, Javed Mohammad, a 56-year-old social activist, was sitting down to eat with his family when news of the Sulli deals app—an application to auction Muslim women online—flashed across the television screen, abruptly ending the dinner time banter.
The next person to speak was Mohammad’s daughter Afreen Fatima, a 24-year-old student activist, who told her father that she was among the scores of Muslim women whose names and photos were shown on the app.
There was shock and concern, but her family were acquainted with the online abuse and castigating coverage she received from pro-government media after Afreen started speaking about the persecution of Indian Muslims under the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), inviting the wrath of the right-wing establishment. Together, father and daughter, along with the rest of the family, living in Prayagraj in southern Uttar Pradesh, decided to pursue the legal route to hold the people behind the app accountable. A few days later, Afreen joined other women in persuading the Delhi police to register a criminal case against them.
Her sister and father for once agreed on something, Sumaiya Fatima, the youngest of Mohammad’s five children, smiled and recalled in conversation with Article 14. She spoke of the many disagreements her father and sister had on everything from the curtains in their house to whether the Congress Party had ever been a force for good in the country.
Even though they are both vocal critics of the BJP and its majoritarian politics, what they believed and how they expressed themselves were different.
“He was Afreen appi’s (sister) biggest supporter, but he would worry if something about her went viral. He would tell her to take care of what she said and how she said it. He would tell her the same thing can be expressed differently,” said Saumaiya. “He has always been very protective of me, but he is the proudest of Afreen appi.”
The UP police arrested Mohammad in connection with the violence that erupted in Prayagraj on 10 June, as rallies protesting the remarks made by BJP spokesperson Nupur Sharma against the Prophet Mohammad were breaking out in UP. The police called him the “mastermind” of the violence, illegally detained his wife and youngest daughter at a police station, and demolished their house, claiming it was an unauthorised construction.
After jailing him 260 km east of Prayagraj, in Deoria district, under more than 20 sections of the Indian Penal Code, 1860, including rioting with deadly weapon, using criminal force to deter a public servant from discharge of his duty, and attempt to murder, the UP Police booked Mohammad under the National Security Act (NSA), 1980, which allows for one year of incarceration without charges.
In July, Article 14 reported the weakness in the police case against the people they accuse of planning the riots, including evidence that defence lawyers say shows their clients to be elsewhere on the day of the violence and lack of evidence to back up the kind of violence—shooting pistols and lobbing bombs—described in the first information reports (FIRs) based on complaints by policemen.
A piece of evidence the police have publicly spoken about is a 12-bore pistol and 315-bore pistol and bullets they claim to have recovered amidst the rubble of his house, hours after national television channels televised the demolition allegedly carried out without due process.
An FIR says the police apprehended Mohammad and recovered a 315-bore pistol from his person. The police claimed that Mohammad had called for a “bandh” and asked people to reach the spot of the incident through a WhatsApp message.
His family said the items removed from the house were broadcast for everyone to see, and the police made no such claim at the time. They say that CCTV footage shows him on a scooty near his house on the afternoon of the violence and that he had called off the rally in a Facebook post the previous day.
While the superintendent of police in Prayagraj, Ajay Kumar, did not publicly share any evidence against Afreen Fatima after the violence in June, Kumar accused her “of being involved in such activities”, and said, “the father-daughter duo together propagate propaganda.”
For the family, these remarks have Roysed apprehensions for her future.
Article 14 spoke with friends, family, lawyers, activists and the police to find out more about Mohammad and why he has been jailed amid a slew of legal action against those critical of the attacks against minorities and free speech under the BJP, including vocal Indian Muslims—recently, fact checker Mohammad Zubair, and journalist Siddique Kappan for the past two years.
This story was originally published in article-1.com . Read the full story here