Indian police arrested seven people for celebrating Pakistan cricket victory

Indian police on Sunday arrested seven Muslim youths for allegedly celebrating Pakistan’s victory over India in a cricket match.

Yogi Adityanath, the chief minister of Uttar Pradesh, a senior Bharatiya Janata Party leader, said in a tweet that on top of the allegations of cyber terrorism and “promoting enmity between groups”, the three could be charged with sedition, police said. accused him after his arrest. on Wednesday.

Another prominent BJP politician, federal cabinet minister Siddharth Nath Singh told NDTV news channel that Uttar Pradesh Police will take the strictest possible action against anyone to cheer India’s defeat in Sunday’s T20 World Cup cricket game in Dubai. .

The three youths Arshid Yusuf, Inayat Altaf Sheikh and Shaukat Ahmed Ganai are engineering students at Raja Balwant Singh College in Agra and belong to Kashmir. He is also accused of posting messages on social media supporting Pakistan. The college has suspended him.

Another three youths were arrested from Bareilly and one from Lucknow.

The Jammu and Kashmir Police has also registered a case against some students at two medical colleges in Srinagar to celebrate Pakistan’s victory. Mohammed Shami, India’s only Muslim cricketer in the T20 team, was subjected to online abuse after India’s defeat.

The issue of some Indian Muslims cheering and clapping whenever Pakistan beat India in a cricket match has been the subject of controversy for decades.

BJP supporters and Hindu nationalists attack behavior like betrayal or sedition.

Liberals reject this, saying that Indians should be free to support anyone they want in cricket or any other area of life, and exaggerate allegations of Hindu extremists attempting to defame Muslims. should be accused of

Adityanath has been running an anti-Muslim campaign involving arbitrary arrests and intimidation since he came to power in the state in 2017. They have removed Muslim names of many cities and railway stations and replaced them with Hindu names.

During protests against the controversial Indian citizenship law in 2019, when Muslims took to the streets to protest, properties of several Muslim men were confiscated, who were fined heavily for allegedly vandalizing public property. was given, which was impossible for them to pay.

Adityanath had said at the time that fines and confiscations were revenge against those involved in the violence in the demonstrations.

Indian police arrested seven people for celebrating Pakistan cricket victory

Last month, he banned the sale of meat in Mathura, a city that Hindus consider sacred because it is the birthplace of Lord Krishna. Meat trade is a traditional Muslim business.

Mathura was the latest in an ever-growing list of cities in the state where the sale of meat was banned in order to “protect” Hindu sentiments.