Delhi carnage: How police made Sajid Khan an accused in his own case
Khan was shot in Northeast Delhiâs Maujpur. When he filed an FIR, the police charged him and five fellow Muslims.
13 Mar, 2021
Sajid Khan, 34, does not remember much of February 25, 2020. The daily wager, who moved coolers for a living, had left for work that morning. On February 23 and 24, Northeast Delhiâs Maujpur had been consumed by communal violence, allegedly provoked by an incendiary speech by BJP leader Kapil Mishra. The third day began with a deceptive calm. By afternoon, the conflagration fomented once again, and a panicking Khan raced from Vijay Park to his home in Kardampuri across the Shahdara drain.
Newslaundry.
The conversation starts with Nidhi asking how Ayush feels about going back to reporting on the 2020 Delhi carnage. She also asks both of them if they think doing the same thing over and over again and being exposed to this sort of violence desensitises a reporter or equips them to handle it with more empathy?
Ayush and Akanksha agree. âIt equips you better to handle emotional outbursts no matter what story youâre working and also you go with a better approach,â says Akanksha.
The discussion moves on to Akankhaâs
report about the hundreds of job aspirants in Uttar Pradesh who are yet to get appointment letters despite clearing the village development officer exam a year ago. Akanksha explains how she got a lead for the story, explains the hiring process and what s holding up the appointment letters.
Arif gets bail in all Delhi carnage cases. But poverty keeps him in jail
Twenty seven police cases over 17 years against Mohammad Arif, now accused of killing fellow Muslims during the 2020 carnage, have left his poor family unable to afford the bail bond.
Mohammad Arifâs mother Parveen at her home in Brijpuri.
Mohammad Arif, 35, has been in jail for 10 months. He is accused of killing three Muslim men during the 2020
communal carnage in the capital city. When we met his mother, Parveen, at her home in Brijpuri in northeast Delhi last year, she had
no money to hire a lawyer to help her son. A month later, an advocate reached out to the family and offered to represent Arif for free. By February 22, the eve of the first year of the
granted bail to three men accused of
murdering Shahid Alam during the communal carnage in Delhiâs northeast last February.
In a chargesheet filed in June, the Delhi police had claimed that Shahid, 25, a rickshaw driver from Mustafabad, was shot dead by alleged Muslim rioters on the roof of an iron warehouse in Chand Bagh on February 24, 2020. And they had arrested the six accused men in March and April, the police added.
The policeâs investigation had sidestepped a Hindu mob that stood on the roof of Mohan Nursing Home, a multistorey hospital 78 metres away, that day, with one rioter holding a rifle.