India
Delhi Police detains two men who claimed attack on Umar Khalid
The Delhi Police detained two men who had earlier claimed to have attacked popular JNU student leader Umar Khalid outside the Constitution Club in New Delhi. The leader was at the Club to attend an event, “Khauff Se Azaadi”, organised by ‘United Against Hate’. “There is an atmosphere of fear in the country, and anybody who speaks against the government is threatened,” he said after the attack.
The two men, identifying themselves as Sarvesh Shahpur and Naveen Dalal had said that they would surrender at the house of Sikh revolutionary Kartar Singh Sarabha on August 17, however, they did not show up.
On Friday, teams from Delhi and Ludhiana rural police had donned civilian clothes and were patrolling the area. Police confirmed that the two men, suspected to be from Haryana, did not surrender.
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The Delhi Police has started to track the phone number which was used to send threats to Gujarat MLA Jignesh Mevani and JNU student Shehla Rashid after popular JNU student leader, Umar Khalid was shot at. He escaped, unhurt.
According to sources in the Delhi Police Special Cell, it is being probed whether the number is registered in a foreign country. “We will contact the service provider… to ascertain which country the messages came from,” said a police officer. Police sources said once they identify the country, they can access the details of the user.
The messages were sent to Rashid and Mewani in June and in August. The sender had claimed to be Indian gangster Ravi Pujary. The sender had told Mewani that he would harm Khalid.
Last year, Gauri Lankesh, a senior Kannada journalist known for her criticism of Hindu extremism, wasshot dead at her home. Lankesh, 55, was the daughter of famous poet-turned-journalist P Lankesh. She was the editor of Gauri Lankesh Patrike, writing often against Sangh organisations and communal violence in the country.
Recently, the SIT probing the case suspects that four top-level leaders of a pro-Hindutva outfit were the ones who conceived the plot to kill her and other rationalists, the news minute reported.
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According to the report, it has been revealed that the six accused in the case were the executors of the murder plot and investigators have launched a hunt for four more persons connected to the murder.
“There is a suspicion that a retired Army Colonel, who became a member of a pro-Hindutva outfit is one of the four men who hatched the plot,” the SIT source added.
In August 2015, scholar, rationalist and teacher M.M. Kalburgi was shot dead at his home in the north Karnataka town of Dharwad for his views against the Hindutva brigade.
