Plea in HC against Delhi Minority Commission Chairman over controversial post

A plea was filed in the Delhi High Court seeking action against Chairman of Delhi Minorities Commission Zafarul-Islam Khan for allegedly making inflammatory and threatening statements in a social media post.

The petition was filed by social activist Manoranjan Kumar through lawyer Siddharth Acharya.

In his petition, he claimed that Zafarul-Islam Khan, Chairman of Delhi Minorities Commission, had posted a post on Facebook against the Hindu community on April 28 calling, labelling and referring the Hindu Community as 'Hindutva Bigots', and threatening the members of the Hindu community of dire consequences.

In his plea, he said that Khan had intentionally and extremely cleverly made the post with the intent of vigilantism and intention to cause a rift between religions at such a sensitive time when the country is suffering from a Pandemic of Coronavirus.

He said that the actions of Khan have made him liable under Section 153A, 295A and 505(2) of the Indian Penal Code as it is evident from the actions that he published in the form of visible representations several inflammatory statements to promote enmity between the two groups on grounds of religion.

The plea said that Khan has used the medium of social media and networking to propagate hatred amongst the Muslim community against Hindu Community as a whole as Khan has played a wicked game by not even hinting as to who specifically he referred to as Hindutva Bigots, thus implicating the whole Hindu Community and outraging their character and conduct on volatile social media turf Facebook.

In his plea, he has sought notice to Khan on his statement and Delhi Government on what actions have been taken in furtherance of this incident within statutory power within Delhi Minorities Commission Act, 1999.

The plea also sought direction to Police to lodge FIR against Khan. He also sought to forfeit the Facebook Account of the Khan in the interest of Public Peace and National Security. He has also sought to take appropriate steps within the statutory power provided within Section 4(4) of Delhi Minorities Commission Act, 1999 which expressly provides that the Government shall remove a person from the post of Chairperson or Member.

The petition said that as it is completely evident by the conduct of the Khan that he deliberately misused his position as the Chairperson of the Commission and his continuance in office is detrimental to the interests of Minorities and the public interest.

( With inputs from ANI )