Will Maha govt take action against ATS officials: Owaisi
The Hyderabad MP posted on social media platform 'X' that for 12 Muslim men who were in jail for 18 years for a crime they didn't commit, their prime life was gone, while there was no closure for over 180 families who lost their loved ones, and those who were injured. 'Will Government take action against officers of Maharashtra ATS who investigated this case?' he asked.
'Innocent people are sent to jail and then years later when they are released from jail there is no possibility for reconstruction of their lives. From last 17 years these accused are in jail. They haven't stepped out even for a day. The majority of their prime life is gone,' wrote Owaisi.
Nineteen years after the 2006 Mumbai train blasts claimed 189 lives and left over 800 people injured, the Bombay High Court on Monday acquitted all 12 people convicted by a lower court in the serial bombing case. In 2015, a trial court had convicted these 12 accused, sentencing five of them to death and the others to life imprisonment.
Setting aside the trial court order, the high court bench of Justice Anil Kilor and Justice Shyam Chandak said the prosecution had "utterly failed" to prove the case against the accused.
The All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) president slammed the police for the way they handle terror cases. 'In such cases where there is a public outcry, the approach by police is always to first assume guilt and then go from there. Police officers take press conferences in such cases, and the way the media covers the case, it kind of decides the guilt of a person. In many such terror cases, investigating agencies have failed us miserably," posted Owaisi.
'Please remember which parties where (were) ruling Maharashtra in 2006 they are also responsible for disregarding complaints of torture ,& of course the 6pm & 9pm (So called) Nationalist who passed judgments on the guilt of the accused,' he added.
Citing the case of Mohammed Majid, one of the 12 men acquitted, Owaisi said his wife died without a final conversation with Majid.
The father of Faisal and Muzammil, two brothers who are among those acquitted, died of a heart attack after hearing the verdict of death and life sentence for his sons. Their mother died in 2023, wrote the MP.
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
New Indian Express
8 minutes ago
- New Indian Express
Madras HC imposes Rs 10,000 fine on Kumari cops, transfers dowry case
MADURAI: The Madurai Bench of Madras High Court has imposed penalty of Rs 10,000 on Kanniyakumari police for failing to take action on a dowry harassment complaint made by a woman at the Nagercoil All Women Police Station, despite orders passed by the magistrate court and the high court. The judge further directed the SP to transfer the case from the AWPS to some other sincere investigation officer. Justice B Pugalendhi passed the order while allowing a contempt petition filed by J Udhaya Santhiya. She had lodged a dowry harassment complaint against her husband and in-laws with Nagercoil All Women Police in February 2023. Since there was no action, she moved the district Munsif cum Judicial Magistrate court in Boothapandi, and the court directed police to inquire into the complaint and register a case. In spite of the order, police did not hold inquiry following which Santhiya moved the HC. In February last year, the court directed police to comply with the magistrate's order. Even then, the police did not register a case, forcing Santhiya to file a contempt petition.
Scroll.in
8 minutes ago
- Scroll.in
India's bulldozer demolitions are being fuelled by political silence
In June, the Assam government demolished just over 600 Muslim homes in Goalpara district in what it described as a crackdown on ' illegal encroachments '. In Jahangirpuri in Delhi, homes and shops were razed despite a Supreme Court stay in April. The next month, the Ahmedabad municipality demolished 8,500 houses in Danilimda in a drive aimed at 'illegal Bangladeshis'. The same month, in Saharanpur in Uttar Pradesh, a mosque under construction was demolished without warning. Bulldozers have emerged as the state's favourite weapon in Narendra Modi's India, flattening Muslim neighbourhoods with clinical choreography. Each such demolition redraws the geography of citizenship and belonging. Like Israel's bulldozers in Gaza and the West Bank, India's bulldozers flatten buildings while erasing memory, rewriting history and reinforcing majoritarian rule. Italian philosopher Giorgio Agamben warns of the 'state of exception': legal limbo where democratic rights are suspended in the name of national interest. Agamben's 'state of exception' is evident when citizenship is overridden by suspicion, when due process is abandoned and when the law is fashioned into a tool of punishment. The state that is meant to protect rights becomes an agent of violation. 'We lost everything in a day,' Fatima Begum, a mother of four in Goalpara told The Observer Post. 'My children now suffer in the heat and rain. We only ask for dignity and safety.' Dignity is precisely what is being denied, deliberately. In Goalpara, the administration cited a 2021 land notification, claiming that the homes were located in a wetland. If that is true, why were only Muslim homes demolished? Were notices issued? What compensation was paid? Was there the basic recognition that these are landowners, labourers, teachers, children – citizens? 'This is not just an attack on property but on our identity,' schoolteacher Imran Hussain told The Observer Post. The bulldozer, as the mascot of a majoritarian state, arrives after riots, militant attacks or just before elections. It performs collective punishment, collapses the law into spectacle and leaves behind silence. It is demographic engineering bearing a saffron flag. The bulldozer is theology in motion. It enforces a belief that Muslims are intruders on Indian soil and their citizenship conditional. As damning as the state's actions is the near-silence or symbolic deflection of the so-called secular parties. In Assam, the Congress opposition leader wrote to Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma of the Bharatiya Janata Party to halt the evictions and the police reportedly stopped an eight-member delegation from reaching the site. But beyond this procedural tokenism, there has been no serious political reckoning, no sustained outrage. Not one senior national leader of the Congress, Rashtriya Janata Dal, Samajwadi Party or Trinamool Congress showed up. Apart from a few headlines, there was no press conference or protest. There is now a quiet consensus across much of the political spectrum that Muslim suffering no longer warrants attention. The logic is cynical and dangerous: Muslims will not vote for the BJP anyway, so why speak? Why risk Hindu votes by opposing bulldozers? A few lone voices, like Communist Party of India (Marxist) leader Subhashini Ali, have spoken out. But most parties are mute, cautious or calculating, treating Muslim pain as a liability rather than a constitutional crisis. This is the new arithmetic of Indian politics. Parties flaunt their Hinduness, visiting temples, reciting mantras, donning sacred threads, believing that if they just appear Hindu enough, political victory is certain. However, Hindutva is not just a vote bank but a project of erasure. The more political parties pander to this script, the more they become like the Aam Aadmi Party in Delhi – hollow, spineless, and complicit. The BJP may have started the bulldozer down this dangerous path, but it is the silence of the rest that propels it forward. Much like the Zionist strategies in Palestine, where demolitions serve to fragment, displace and erase Palestinian presence, India's Hindutva regime is scripting its own slow-motion Nakba. Even the Supreme Court, which has declared such demolitions 'totally unconstitutional', is routinely ignored. When bulldozers move faster than law, what remains of constitutionalism? More than a 'Muslim issue', this is a warning to every Indian. When citizenship becomes negotiable for one community, all are rendered vulnerable. We are witnessing the emergence of a parallel era where excavators dictate justice and headlines normalise apartheid. Where displaced women are forced to give birth in plastic tents. Where children study in the shadows of debris. Where heatstroke deaths are accepted collateral in the war against an unwanted identity. The bulldozer is an emblem of Hindu supremacy that leaves behind broken lives and the broken promise of equal citizenship. Listen to the sound of a republic disappearing: crumbling homes and the steady hum of machinery.
Hans India
an hour ago
- Hans India
Kishan Reddy accuses Congress of betraying BCs with its reservation policies
Hyderabad: In a sharp critique of the Congress Party's reservation framework, Union Minister G Kishan Reddy accused Congress of deliberately misleading Backward Classes (BCs) with its proposed 42 per cent reservation scheme for local bodies, which includes a 10 per cent quota for Muslims. Addressing the media in the national capital, Delhi, on Friday, the Minister referred to a precedent set by former Chief Minister Y.S. Rajasekhar Reddy, who introduced a 4 per cent reservation for Muslims under the BC-E category during his tenure. This action was struck down twice by the High Court. Although Congress later obtained a stay from the Supreme Court to continue implementing the reservation, Reddy contends that this move was 'unconstitutional' and detrimental to the core BC groups. Kishan Reddy alleged that Congress inflated BC population figures by including 10 per cent Muslims in the claimed 56 per cent BC demographic, reducing actual BC numbers to 46 per cent. He said that the party's attempt to hike the Muslim reservation quota from 4 per cent to 10 per cent within the BC framework is labeled as unjust. Referring to the GHMC elections, where 34 per cent BC reservations allegedly benefited AIMIM candidates, not genuine BCs, he added. Reddy emphasized that reservations historically apply to castes engaged in traditional hereditary occupations and accused Congress of diverting these benefits for political appeasement. He warned that, under the guise of uplifting BCs, Congress was actually diminishing the 34 per cent BC quota to 32% after merging the 10 per cent Muslim component. The Minister highlighted the BJP's achievements in promoting BC leadership, including the appointment of BC members to the Union Cabinet and the granting of constitutional status to the BC Commission. He contrasted this with Congress's alleged failure to elevate BCs to Chief Minister or Prime Minister positions since independence. Kishan Reddy criticized the Congress leaders' remarks questioning Prime Minister Narendra Modi's community. He clarified that Modi was included in the BC list in 1994 under the Congress-led government of Gujarat, which occurred before his political ascent. He also questioned the logic behind labeling several communities as 'converted' BCs, citing the inclusion of Vishwakarmas and the Lambada community in SC/ST lists over decades. Calling out Congress's decline in electoral relevance, Reddy asserted that the party had been rejected in key states and faced significant losses, including zero seats in Delhi. He attributed the recent personal attacks on Modi to frustration among Congress leaders, including Rahul Gandhi and Revanth Reddy. He said that the BJP is demanding that local body elections be conducted in line with Telangana High Court orders and that the proposed 42 per cent BC reservations exclude Muslim beneficiaries. Kishan Reddy urged Congress to clarify who stands to gain from this model and challenged Revanth Reddy to resign as Chief Minister in favor of a BC candidate.
