The Rihai Manch and its associates had called for a press conference on January 21, 2020 to discuss the wrongdoing of the UP government during the anti-Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) agitation. Addressing the press conference were Prashant Bhushan, Senior Advocate; Mohd. Shoaib, Senior Advocate and President of Rihai Manch; Hartosh Bal, Political Editor, The Caravan; Rajeev Yadav, General Secretary, Rihai Manch; Mangla Verma, Advocate and Gufran Siddiqui, Social Activist. Anil Chamadia, Senior Journalist chaired the meeting.
Advocate Mohammad Shoaib, the President of the Rihai Manch who was imprisoned for a month for opposing the unconstitutional Citizenship Amendment Act, spoke to journalists at the Press Club of India saying that he was also arrested during the Emergency and was hailed as a freedom fighter, and he was now too proud as he was trying to uphold the values of the Constitution.
On December 18, 2019, Mohammad Shoaib was charged under Sec 107/117 of the IPC and put under house arrest. The next night, he was taken by the police on the pretext of meeting the Circle Inspector. However, his relatives and members of the Rihai Manch got to know that he was detained at the Hazratganj police station. The police claimed he was released the following morning on December 20 at the Clarks Awadh Chowk in Lucknow, but that was not the case and nobody was aware of the 76-year-old Shoaib’s whereabouts for a month.
He spoke about the unfair treatment of the people by the Uttar Pradesh police and the false news spread by the newspapers in a bid to discredit the work done by the Manch and its members. Mohammad Shoaib also said that the agitation against CAA turned violent because they were disrupted by the members of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). He also spoke about Robin Verma, a member of the Manch, who was falsely implicated and beaten up severely at the police station. Not just that, he was also terminated from his professorship at the Shia PG College and the police associated his name with Kashmiri ‘stone-pelters’, abused him and his family members and threatened him with cases that would ruin his life forever.
The police, Shoaib said, also tried to get their hands on Rajeev Yadav and termed him and other members of the Manch as ‘miscreants’. Shoaib said that such behaviour of the police only showed that the police was targeting individuals who were advocating for the rights and welfare of the common people. He said, “There is considerable threat to their safety and well-being, as illustrated during the police interrogations. Even other people in jails said they were asked about the whereabouts of Rajeev, even though there were many people brought in for throwing stones at the peaceful protest. The police received calls from the BJP office, following which the actual stone-pelters were respectfully served tea and escorted out.”
Mr. Hartosh Bal, Political Editor, The Caravan, said that the torture and prosecution by the police were reflective of their personal vendetta against the members of the Manch. He said that the high-ranking police officers only served the ill aspirations of the Sangh and because the Rihai Manch was raising crucial questions about the indiscriminate killings of Dalits, Muslims and OBC youth under the ‘Thhok Do’ policy and extra-judicial killings, they had earned the ire of the Uttar Pradesh government.
He added that the due to the efforts of the Manch and other progressive groups, they had been instrumental in getting innocent people falsely accused in terror cases acquitted. Mentioning the documentary highlighting the politics of UP CM Yogi he said, “14 people have been finally let off by the court in recent cases. A documentary highlighting the politics and actions of Yogi Adityanath made by members of the Manch in the past, had also incriminated the current CM, and an FIR was filed against on the basis of this evidence. It is noteworthy that the General Secretary of Rihai Manch, Mr. Rajeev Yadav has been explicitly warned by the police of dire consequences. He had strongly opposed the illegal imposition of the National Security Act (NSA) against many Muslim and Dalit youth and the police atrocities committed against many of them during the nation-wide agitations of 2nd April, 2018.”
Saying that many members of the Manch had had their phones tapped and were being profiled, Rajeev Yadav said, “The Yogi Adityanath led government wants to save itself by trying to prosecute these individuals and wearing them out with several false cases.”
Adv. Mangala Verma said, “The cases of police encounter and extra-judicial killings have followed a pattern of involvement of high ranking officials in the police and administration, and has been promoted as the police model to control crime. The documentation of these crimes point to the nature of discrimination and exclusion dominating the UP police.”
Senior journalist Mr. Anil Chamadia said that Rihai Manch has done a lot of work in defence of democracy. Muslims, Dalits and OBCs have been targeted many times by the RSS and its affiliates. It is attempt to malign and isolate them. It has specially the legal case of those who were wrongly killed, prosecuted and harassed by the police. It has also exposed the sectarianism of the police and the Chief Minister.
Senior advocate Prashant Bhushan called out the repeated abuse of power by the police and the administration in Uttar Pradesh. He said that there has a complete collapse of the rule of law in the state, and the impunity with which the police has operated, has been ordered by the Chief Minister himself. Speaking about the crimes being committed by the police of a serious nature, he also said that the current events in India were akin to a second freedom movement where the common people weren’t fighting the British but those who do not believe in the Constitution and are not willing to let democracy and rule of law to flourish.
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