Definitely something fishy about Khalid Mujahid's death: Zafaryab Jilani
Uttar Pradesh additional advocate general (AAG) Zafaryab Jilani on Saturday said that there was definitely something fishy in terror accused Khalid Mujahid’s custodial death. Gulam Jeelani reports.
Uttar Pradesh additional advocate general (AAG) Zafaryab Jilani on Saturday said that there was definitely something fishy in terror accused Khalid Mujahid’s custodial death.
He however clarified that chief minister Akhilesh Yadav and national president of Samajwadi Party Mulayam Singh Yadav had no role to play at all.
“The circumstances in which Khalid died were certainly mysterious. But the CM and Mulayam Singh Yadav had no role to play,” Jilani told HT on the sidelines of a function organized in Lucknow to felicitate him after a ten day visit to the United States (US). He said that he told this to US based human rights activists and members of US Congress during his visit.
Jilani, who is also convener of Babri Masjid Action Committee (BAMC) and Executive Committee member of All India Muslim Personal Law board (AIMPLB) visited US on invitation of Indian American Muslim Council (IAMC)-a US based organisation-comprising mostly Aligarh Muslim University (AMU) alumni.
He participated in a series of seminars highlighting the ‘persecution of Muslims in India’ being organised by IAMC in five US cities including a three day event in Washington DC. The ‘cold blooded murder’ of Khalid Mujahid was also an issued discussed there.
“I interacted with US based human rights activists and members of US Congress there. We discussed different issues including the Khalid Mujahid death issue
Khalid, an alleged Harkat-ul-Jehad-e-Islami (HuJI) operative and an accused in serial blasts that rocked Lucknow and Faizabad courts in November 2007, died on May 18 after he fell sick and fainted, according to police, near Barabanki while being escorted to Lucknow jail after a court hearing.
Jilani said that he also apprised participants of the seminars that there were many cases in India where Muslim youth were wrongly implicated in terror cases.
“I told them we in India have laws safeguarding human rights but what we lack is an Act that would ensure compensation to those acquitted after being falsely implicated and punishment to the officials found responsible,” he added.
He said he also informed the participants about the action taken by the government that includes ordering a CBI probe and lodging an FIR against 42 police officials as demanded by Khalid’s kin. “I told them that government has ordered an inquiry and reality would come to fore to soon,” he added.
It is pertinent to mention in Lucknow that Jilani’s visit to US had sparked of a controversy among AMU alumni alleging him of being inclined towards SP government. Many AMU alumnis, including those based in USA, had decide to boycott all these programmes scheduled between June 14 and June 24.