Image Courtesy: thecognate.com
On June 22, 2022, Twitter suspended the account of Ex-IPS Officer Nirmal Chandra Asthana for violating the Twitter Rules for his anti-Muslim tweets.
Asthana is a 1986 batch officer and the former Director-General of Police (DGP) Kerala. He has previously served in senior positions in the Border Security Force (BSF) and Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) and has also served as director of vigilance and the Anti-Corruption Bureau in Kerala. He retired in December 2019.
Last week Asthana had shared a video of Uttar Pradesh Police brutally assaulting the riots accused at Saharanpur police station calling it a “Beautiful scene”. The video had surfaced online soon after protests broke out in various parts of India over the remarks made by BJP spokesperson Nupur Sharma against Prophet Mohammed.
In various tweets, Asthana praised Uttar Pradesh CM Yogi Adityanath by addressing him as ‘Maharaj’ and supported the demolition drive undertaken in several parts of the country.
Two weeks ago, there was another viral video where an assistant professor in Aligarh was seen offering prayers in the garden of a college campus who was then reportedly suspended for a month as an inquiry was initiated against him. With respect to this, Asthana tweeted, “This is good news. People must be taught a lesson otherwise people catch hold of the whole hand when asked to hold a finger. This was only possible in Maharaj’s (Yogi Adityanath) rule.”
He even went on to mock students when the Supreme Court rejected their plea to postpone NEET PG 2022 exam by calling them names such as ‘Latkhor’, ‘Gadho’, ‘Duffers’, etc.
Over the past weeks he has also been tweeting in support of police brutality. For example, he reportedly shared a picture of a Muslim protester being beaten using polycarbonate pipes by the police in Prayagraj, and tweeted that he regretted the introduction of these pipes and believed that the “good old linseed oil soaked bamboo lathis were better.”
Ironically, in December 2021, he wrote a piece for ‘The Wire’ titled, ‘Why Police Brutality and Torture Are Endemic in India’ and said that there is nothing intrinsic to the job of policing that makes them brutal or high-handed, reported the Print.
It is interesting to note that amongst his 49 books, he has written a book on ‘State Persecution of Minorities and Underprivileged in India’ which has been reviewed by Justice J. Chelameswar (Retd) of the Supreme Court. Moreover, in December 2021, he wrote yet another piece for ‘The Wire’ titled, ‘A Hate-Filled Call to Arms and Violence at Haridwar’ calling out hate spewed against the Muslim minorities at the religious conclave.
Related:
Demons to Jihadis, BJP’s Haribhushan Bachaul targets Muslims yet again
Hindu Sena distributes swords in the support of Nupur Sharma and Naveen Jindal
Hate Offender: Who is Maulana Tauqeer Raza?