The Aligarh police on Sunday booked four persons, including a woman, who accused ex-BJP Mayor Shakuntala Bharti of forcibly changing the religion of her sister to get her married to a Hindu boy. The police said the girl was an adult and she eloped with the boy on her own will and that her statement has been recorded under 164 CrPc before a magistrate.
Nazia Saifi called a press conference on Sunday with the help of two local journalists and a local AMIM leader. The police arrested journalists Faizan and Shiraz Ahmed from the spot for violating prohibitory orders and Section 3 of the Epidemic Diseases Act. Nazia alias Asiya and AMIM leader Mohd Nazim escaped. Besides charging them with breaking the lockdown rules, the police also invoked Section 153 A (promoting enmity between different communities) and 505 (2) (making statements to spread hatred) of the IPC against the four, in the FIR .
In a video, Ms Asiya could be heard saying that her sister had been missing since August 7. She said her husband had filed a missing person complaint in the local police station but the police didn’t do anything. “When I threatened to go to the media, the police brought my sister in a car where she was accompanied by Shakuntala Bharti and I was not allowed to speak to my sister despite repeated requests. Ms Bharti is converting Muslim girls... this is something wrong that is happening with Muslims... who would get me justice,” she says in the video.
Dismisses allegations
Ms Bharti told reporters that the allegations were baseless and she would leave the State if they were found to be true. Meanwhile, a marriage certificate has surfaced, showing that the two got married in an Arya Samaj temple in Lucknow on August 10.
Abhishek, Suprintendent of Police (City) Aligarh, told The Hindu that when the girl went missing on August 7, her brother-in-law lodged a complaint in the Sasni Gate police station. “We registered a case under sections 363 and 366 of the IPC. However, when the girl was recovered and produced before a magistrate, she said she had run away with Rishabh out of her own will and married him. The date of birth in her high school certificate proved that she was an adult. The investigation is still on, but these are the facts of the case so far.” On the allegations of the girl’s sister, he said as an adult it was up to her in whose company she moved and who she wanted to remain in touch with.
