IN what has emerged as a pattern of activists who speak out against the government being harassed, the authorities in Uttar Pradesh have detained Dr Kafeel Khan under the stringent National Security Act (NSA). Under the provisions of the Act, he can be kept behind bars for a year without any charges being filed and without access to a lawyer.
Dr Khan is accused of making an inflammatory speech at a protest against the Citizenship (Amendment) Act (CAA) in Aligarh Muslim University (AMU) on December 13 last year. News outlets have cited this​ remark to prove his anti-national credentials: “Tum hume nahi hata paoge, hum 25 crore hai” (you will not be able to throw us out, we [Indian Muslims] are 25 crore). While his speech was passionate, only by a wild stretch of the imagination can it be described as instigating violence. By invoking the NSA against Dr Khan, the Yogi Adityanath regime has only exposed its own politics of vendetta.
Dr Khan’s wife wondered how his speech could be seen as inflammatory when he was only echoing the sentiments expressed by many others and in a much milder way. She questioned the basis of his detention under the NSA and asserted that such intimidatory tactics would not stop people like her from speaking out against the government’s unjust policies and excesses.
Two days after Dr Khan gave his speech, the police used excessive force on the AMU campus: they fired tear gas shells, entered hostels, vandalised the premises and injured scores of students. There were allegations that the police fired live ammunition. A first information report (FIR) filed at the Civil Lines police station under Sections 153 A (promoting enmity between different groups), 153 B and 109 of the Indian Penal Code accused Dr Khan of provoking the students, vitiating the university’s peaceful atmosphere and disturbing communal harmony.
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