Post about Prophet Muhammad triggers riots in Bengaluru, BJP blames radical PFI’s political arm
Three people were killed and three others unfortunately harmed after the Bengaluru Police started shooting to control revolts that broke out late Tuesday, after fights emitted over an online networking post purportedly offending Prophet Muhammad.
Furious crowds went out of control in the Kaval Byrasandra territory to challenge the Facebook post, supposedly set up by P. Naveen, nephew of Pulakeshinagar MLA Akhanda Srinivasa Murthy of the Congress.
ಡಿ.ಜಿ ಹಳ್ಳಿ ಪೊಲೀಸ್ ಠಾಣಾ ವ್ಯಾಪ್ತಿಯಲ್ಲಿ ಕಿಡಿಗೇಡಿಗಳು ಶಾಸಕ ಅಖಂಡ ಶ್ರೀನಿವಾಸ ಅವರ ಮನೆ ಹಾಗು ಪೋಲೀಸ್ ಠಾಣೆ ಮೇಲೆ ದಾಳಿ, ಗಲಭೆ ನಡೆಸಿರುವುದು ಖಂಡನೀಯ. ಈಗಾಗಲೇ ದುಷ್ಕರ್ಮಿಗಳ ವಿರುದ್ದ ನಿರ್ದಾಕ್ಷಿಣ್ಯ ಕ್ರಮ ಕೈಗೊಳ್ಳುವಂತೆ ನಿರ್ದೇಶನ ನೀಡಲಾಗಿದ್ದು ಸರ್ಕಾರ ದಾಂಧಲೆ ಹತ್ತಿಕ್ಕಲು ಎಲ್ಲ ರೀತಿಯ ಕ್ರಮ ಕೈಗೊಂಡಿದೆ. (1/2)
— B.S.Yediyurappa (@BSYBJP) August 12, 2020
Occupants started sharing the “hostile” post through messages, and soon, near 600 individuals accumulated close to the Pulakeshinagar police headquarters requesting equity. Groups likewise accumulated outside Murthy’s living arrangement, yelling trademarks and requesting the capture of Naveen, who guaranteed that his record was hacked. The now-erased post has been recovered and the police have captured him to lead a point by point examination.
As per the police, the furious horde at that point depended on fire-related crime and started setting vehicles ablaze. Police sources said the crowd showed up at Murthy’s habitation equipped with lathis, iron bars, and sharp metal articles to attempt to burst in. The MLA was absent at home when the frenzy occurred.
Area 144 of the CrPC, which disallows the get together of more than five individuals, has now been forced over the city. Police magistrate Kamal Pant said 110 individuals have been captured for pyromania, stone-pelting, and attack.
Karnataka Home Minister Basavaraj Bommai said in a video message sent to the media:
“Whatever be the issue, it will be altogether explored. Defacement isn’t the arrangement. The blameworthy, anyway amazing, will be brought to book. I have given the police a free hand to deal with the circumstance.”
In a tweet Wednesday morning, Chief Minister B.S. Yediyurappa said the savagery was unsuitable, and that the culprits would be reserved.
Police activity
Bengaluru Police Commissioner Kamal Pant, additionally addressed the media after the circumstance was managed, saying there was overwhelming police nearness in the uproar hit zones. Gasp said an extra magistrate of police was assaulted and enormous scope property harm has been accounted for.
Two passings were accounted for at first before official Pant affirmed a third.
As indicated by senior cops, more than 20 vehicles were burnt by the crowd, while the vehicle of DCP (north division) Bheemshankar Guled was additionally assaulted.
A senior cop, who would not like to be distinguished, disclosed that they attempted to control the groups through a lathi-charge first. Be that as it may, the groups wouldn’t down and started assaulting cops and their vehicles. Regardless of a few alerts to quiet down, the agitators proceeded with their frenzy, constraining the police to throw nerve gas shells and open shoot when the groups came charging at them.
If anybody has written anything objectionable the law will take its course and there are so many ways in a democracy to fight for justice.
— Dinesh Gundu Rao/ದಿನೇಶ್ ಗುಂಡೂರಾವ್ (@dineshgrao) August 11, 2020
In today’s world of Social Media provocative words are written by crazy people. Let us condemn it.
But Violence is not the answer.
What was written about the Prophet is the working of a sick mind with an intention to create violence.
— Dinesh Gundu Rao/ದಿನೇಶ್ ಗುಂಡೂರಾವ್ (@dineshgrao) August 11, 2020
It is highly objectionable and such statements about any person revered by any community needs to be handled in the strictest way possible by the authorities.
Sources said the circumstance purportedly left hand when an angry gathering of individuals arrived at the police headquarters requesting Naveen’s capture. The police requested that the individuals attempt and sort the circumstance out genially, which supposedly incensed them.
A few Congress pioneers censured the occurrence on Twitter, and MLA Murthy himself likewise delivered a video, engaging for quiet and consoling the open that the villain behind the post had been reserved.
The danger of COVID spread
This is the second uproar that has broken out in Bengaluru in the range of four months. On 19 April, savagery had emitted in Padarayanapura after occupants who were optional contacts of a perished Covid-19 patient would not go with the Bengaluru metropolitan group for isolation around evening time.
A crowd encompassed the police that had been acquired to control the circumstance, prompting the capture of 126 individuals supposedly associated with the brutality. This likewise prompted various new Covid-19 cases, and the organization made some intense memories containing the spread.
The police revealed that in Kaval Byrasandara as well, a few people were neither keeping up social separation nor wearing covers, prompting a higher danger of the spread of the infection.
“We needed to guarantee that the viciousness was controlled. Be that as it may, presently we stress what would occur, in light of the fact that a considerable lot of our police officers also were contaminated in Padarayanapura,” said another official who would not like to be named.
BJP blames PFI
Karnataka minister and BJP pioneer C.T. Ravi Wednesday accused the Social Democratic Party of India (SDPI), the political arm of the radical Popular Front of India (PFI), for the mobs in Bengaluru that left three individuals dead.
The uproars in the Pulakeshinagar get together voting demographic, which additionally observed agitators vandalize and enjoy pyro-crime at the DJ Halli and KG Halli police headquarters, following a hostile Facebook post by an MLA’s nephew about Prophet Mohammed.
Sources in the Bengaluru Police disclosed to ThePrint that the supposed job of the SDPI was under the scanner based on “some proof”.
The SDPI, which has a solid nearness in Karnataka, Kerala, and Tamil Nadu, has denied all charges.
The incident that is happening in Kaval Byrsandra is unfortunate. I am hopeful that police will take action against all those who are responsible for this.
— B Z Zameer Ahmed Khan (@BZZameerAhmedK) August 11, 2020
I also request everyone to stay calm and maintain peace in the area.
There are likewise charges that the mobs might not have been unconstrained however pre-arranged, with previous boss minister H.D. Kumaraswamy backing this hypothesis on Twitter.
Ravi said the SDPI ought to be “prohibited and all associations with such expectations stopped from really developing”.
“Conditional proof shows this demonstration was pre-arranged. We don’t have the opportunity to keep a tab on our Facebook posts, for what reason would they say they were following the posts of this individual? Clearly they were following him,” Ravi included. “It’s very certain that, under the initiative of certain individuals, this could be pre-arranged.
“Every one of the individuals who are included ought to be reserved under the Goonda Act, and the (expenses of the) misfortune to property ought to be recouped from them,” he said.
Ravi likewise emphasized the BJP’s claim that previous Congress boss minister Siddaramaiah had pulled back bodies of evidence recorded against the “counter national PFI” — a charge Siddaramaiah has prior denied.
Top cops near the examination said a few heads from the SDPI were available at the DJ Halli police headquarters Tuesday night to document a grievance against the supposed profane internet based life post. They were in this way joined by a few different individuals, they included.
The brutality is accepted to have started at this police headquarters.
“There is proof pointing towards the SDPI. We are seeing all edges, remembering their conceivable job for these uproars,” a senior cop said. “Be that as it may, we have to completely research it before arriving at a resolution.”
Police sources state “a few” of the 140 individuals captured so far for the brutality are associated with the association. Those captured incorporate SDPI pioneer Muzammil Pasha, who was among the complainants who originally showed up at the DJ Halli police headquarters.
SDPI representative Wasim Ahmed, be that as it may, revealed to ThePrint that the charges were unmerited and shielded Muzammil Pasha.
“Pasha was trusting that the officials will hold up a police protest against the disparaging post. We can’t see how an individual who was in the station to document a grievance is currently being encircled and called a head honcho in this episode,” he said.
Various hypotheses flourish
With the examination yet in progress, a few speculations have flourished as for the specific trigger. One of them is that it was the aftereffect of a family fight, while another proposes it was pre-arranged.
Previous CM H.D. Kumaraswamy of the Janata Dal (Secular) communicated support for the last in a Twitter string Wednesday.
Bengaluru Police Commissioner Kamal Pant would not remark on the charges, saying they are exploring all points even “however introductory examinations show that the horde asserted they felt offended by the ‘irreverent post’ by a nearby MLA’s nephew”.
“Starting at now 140 have been captured and three have passed on, some others are not kidding. The examination has been given over to the Central Crime Branch of the City police,” he said.
In private, be that as it may, a few police officers said there are “sufficient signs” to propose the viciousness was pre-arranged.
“The way where the crowd expand in the police headquarters when the complainants showed up to present their grievance was the main sign that there was something ‘fishy’ occurring,” said a lesser cop who was available at the site of savagery.
The assault at the DJ Halli police headquarters was trailed by one on the living arrangement of Pulakeshinagar MLA Akhand Srinivas Murthy, a Congress chief, and another on the police headquarters at KG Halli close by.
At DJ Halli, a police examiner was heard enlightening an associate concerning the “abrupt development” of individuals holding iron poles and assaulting the doors. Observers revealed to ThePrint that police at DJ Halli was “immediately dwarfed as the crowd “got more vicious”.
