The Delhi High Court has asked the state government to take the decision on removal of Dr. Zafarul Islam Khan as Chairman of Delhi Minorities Commission (DMC) within 2 weeks. This order was given in a plea seeking Dr. Khan’s removal from his position for allegedly making seditious remarks and hateful speeches. The court has given such a timeline to the government since on July 14, Dr. Khan’s term as Chairman comes to an end and by then this process will become infructuous.

The division bench of Justice Manmohan and Justice Sanjeev Narula has issued notices to DMC, Delhi Government and Dr. Khan. As per a status report that was submitted in court by Delhi government, the LG of Delhi has already directed the Administrative Department to initiate action as per section 4(4) of the Delhi Minorities Commission Act, which gives the government power to remove the Chairman under certain criteria.

In the previous hearing the court had informed the Delhi government that the court cannot order the removal of Dr. Khan from his position, before the government forms an opinion on the same.

The petitioner, in his plea, asserts that Dr. Khan brought contempt, hatred and disrespect through his social media post and his continuance in the position of Chairman maligns the image of the state’s Minorities Commission.

The petitioner further states that Dr. Khan’s used derogatory language against the majority community thus promoting disharmony, enmity and ill will likely to disturb public tranquillity and feeling of insecurity amongst different religious groups.

The next date of hearing is June 23.

Dr. Khan was granted protection from coercive steps until June 22, in his anticipatory bail application. He was booked under charges of sedition and for promoting enmity.

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I am not surprised these days how our police is behaving. Those who spread hatred, threaten people openly and intimidate them through social media as well as ‘popular media’, screaming loudly on television channels have never been touched. Look at how hate mongers on TV channels have got full protections by the government. If certain state governments have gone against some of those hate mongers, BJP leaders are defending them as if they are ‘champions’ of civil liberty and democratic rights. Of course, it is an open secret how much BJP as well as Sangh Parivar ‘respect’ these rights of the individuals.

The most disturbing part in the entire episode is the role and silence of Delhi government. Delhi Minority Commission comes under the Delhi government and is a statutory body which has been doing its work quiet independently with Dr Zafarul Islam Khan following cases, visiting families and people victims of the violence in Delhi. Rather than supporting him, the government remains conspicuously silent on the issue. In the last one year, the prejudices and biases in the police forces and administration against Muslims in particular has witnessed a steep high. It is not that these prejudices never existed earlier but there was a certain respect to the constitution and law and authorities were not that brutal and brazen-faced in resorting to unconstitutional means.

I have always maintained that in a democratic society an individual has a right to be perceived innocent till he is proved guilty unless some one has been regularly spreading hatred and threatening people with violent means. Supreme Court has said it many times. In fact, on record, the government too says, that they respect the freedom of expression of the people and right to dissent. BJP leaders are championing rights of ‘dissent’ for serial offenders like Arnab Goswami and Sudhir Chaudhary, who don’t run a media house but are pamphleteer, much worst than Panchjanya and Organiser. At least, in both these mouth pieces of RSS, there are policy briefs and organisational position on various issues.

As the anti CAA protests grew all over the country and in most of the places remained absolutely democratic, peaceful and constitutional, efforts were made to provoke them. The initial response was to neglect them but when their innovative methods became international headlines, it was time for the power to act. The whole of Delhi was put on such a crisis by highly toxic election campaign by the BJP which made opposition parties mainly AAP to approach the elections in a different way. While AAP won a huge mandate, it refused to stand with the people protesting. Not only this, the Delhi government did not have word of warning or caution to police for filing cases against peaceful protesters.

Then came the Donald Trump’s visit to India and sudden change in the strategy of some of these sitting groups particularly on the East Delhi side. With Kapil Mishra openly resorting to threat if the protesters were not removed, violence broke out in East Delhi. Shockingly, rather than sympathising with the victims and survivors, the police seems to be become more ruthless. With no rehabilitation and all those who were forced to sleep on open in the crushing rains and winter, the ‘trends’ of the probe became targeting the victims. More and more cases are being filed against students who actually faced victimisation. There are no cases against those thugs who attacked JNU, hit students with iron rods. People seem to have lost the faith in these probes.

Dr Zafar ul Islam Khan has been active on various front particularly taking the cases of minorities who were victimised and need rehabilitation. Even during the Corona period, he has been active in trying to provide help to the community. I have not gone through all these tweets and do not feel that a person become national or anti national with one tweet or one article. You may disagree with him but people are reacting in deep anguish when they face a situation of helplessness. When a person leading a statutory body like Delhi Minorities Commission can feel being helpless during this crisis, imagine, what could be the condition of others.

Dr Khan has been a scholar of Islam and a deeply secular individual whose father Maulana Wahiduddhin Khan, was often castigated for being ‘secular’. In fact, many in the Sangh Parivar would quote and publish his articles in their journals. In fact, Dr Zafarul Islam Khan built a niche for himself quite independently and started ‘The Millie Gazette’ long back which used to publish articles from not only Muslim scholars but also a large number of non Muslim secular scholars and activists. It became a platform for sharing common concern and ideas. The publication house that he started has some of the finest work on Indian political history and contribution of Muslims in India’s freedom movement.

Today, a large number of activists, authors are languishing in jail for because of their view points. Most of them have dedicated their lives to people’s causes and can never think of being violent. They have lived for the rule of law and constitutional values but today even the doors of the justice are out of bound for them. it is this helplessness of the intellectuals which is the cause of deep worry and dangerous for the democracy. With not much in sight from the political parties, hoping from the courts is expecting too much but then we have no option but to have faith in the judicial system in hope that one day things will change and justice would be done. A perfect case for the Supreme Court may be to ask details of all those authors and activists who are booked under Sedition and UAPA laws and form an independent committee to look into these cases and report to them in a fixed time frame. It is not a big deal and can be really helpful. The second thing can be if the court provide clear guidelines to the police and administration as what constitute being anti national and where does our freedom reach to final limit. This will help in a long long way otherwise it will be only take us towards more authoritarian regimes with media becoming partner with the power acting as its mouth organ.

We hope the Delhi government will defend Dr Zafar-ul Islam Khan and he will get protection from the higher courts.

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Special cell of Delhi Police conducted a raid at the home of Delhi Minorities Commission chairman Dr Zafarul Islam Khan on May 6. A week ago, the Delhi Police had charged Dr Khan with sedition.

As reported earlier, septuagenarian Dr Khan’s is perhaps the only one holding a Constitutional post to be charged under Indian Penal Code section 124 A (sedition) and 153 A (Promoting enmity between different groups on grounds of religion, race, place of birth, residence, language, etc., and doing acts prejudicial to maintenance of harmony). The cases were booked on the basis of a first information report (FIR) filed in Delhi.

On May 6 evening the police landed up at his doorstep. His lawyer, Vrinda Grover, has issued a statement making Delhi Police aware that their actions are against a senior citizen and the law does not permit them to call him to the police station. “You are informed that Dr. Zafarul-Islam Khan is a senior citizen of 72 years age and he suffers from old age related physical illnesses that make him extremely vulnerable to the Covid-19 coronavirus. The law as per section 160 CrPC mandates that the police cannot compel attendance of a person above 65 years age at any place other than their residence for the purpose of investigation and interrogation. You are required as per law to question / interrogate Dr. Zafarul-Islam Khan only in his residence and you cannot compel him to go to any police station,” she stated.

“As Dr. Zafarul-Islam Khan’s lawyer I am hereby placing on record that as per law you cannot compel him to go to the police station. That would violate the CrPC and amount to illegal police action against the rights of my Client,” Vrinda Grover told the police. 

Chairman of the Delhi Minorities Commission, Dr Zafarul Islam Khan (72), is a world renowned scholar, journalist and civil rights activist. He is known the world over as an eminent  Muslim scholar who was one of the first to speak up againt the terror outfit Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS or the Islamic State (IS), and all others who unleash crimes against humanity. His interventions on problems of minorities in Delhi have made him a respectable figure among not only Muslims but Sikh, Christians, Jains and Parsis, say activists, many of whom have spoken out in solidarity with Dr Khan .

On his part, Dr Khan has always said:  “I am a patriot to the core and I have always defended my country abroad.” 
 

Related: 

“I am a patriot to the core and I have always defended my country abroad:”  Dr Zafarul-Islam Khan Chairman, Delhi Minorities Commission

Accusing Dr Zafarul Islam Khan of sedition, is an attempt to intimidate: Activists

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