‘Killed Because He Was Hindu’: Delhi Court Frames Charges Against Tahir Hussain, Others For Murder Of IB Staffer Ankit Sharma

A Delhi Court on Thursday framed charges against former Aam Aadmi Party Councillor Tahir Hussain and 10 other men in the murder case of Intelligence Bureau staffer Ankit Sharma, who was killed during the 2020 Northeast Delhi riots.

Additional Sessions Judge Pulastya Pramachala framed charges against Hussain and others under sections 147, 148, 153A, 302, 365, 120B, 149, 188 and 153A of Indian Penal Code, 1860.

Others who have been charged are Haseen, Nazim, Kasim, Sameer Khan, Anas, Firoz, Javed, Gulfam, Shoaib Alam and Muntajim. 

Hussain has additionally been charged under sections 505, 109 and 114 of IPC. 

However, accused Muntajim has not been charged under sections 153A and 149 of IPC. He has been charged separately under section 174A of the penal code. Other accused persons Salman and Nazim have been also charged under section 25 of the Arms Act.

FIR 65 of 2020 was registered at Dayalpur police station on the basis of the complaint made by deceased’s father. He had lodged a missing report when his son went missing during the riots. Ankit’s body was later recovered from a drain. He was declared as brought dead by GTB hospital.

Perusing the statements of the witnesses, the court observed that the presence of all the accused persons in the mob was well reflected. It added that the mob continuously indulged into firing of gunshots, pelting of stones and petrol bombs towards Hindus and their houses.

“These acts of the mob make it clear that their objective was to harm Hindus in their body and property to maximum possible extent. It is also clearly shown that this mob consciously wanted to even kill Hindus. It cannot be said that being member of this mob, accused persons were oblivious of such objective of this mob. Apparently, this was an unlawful assembly, acting in pursuance of aforesaid object,” the court said.

The judge further said that petrol bombs were also arranged by accumulating the required materials in Tahir Hussain’s house, bottles of Mountain Dew were being filled with petrol and were being taken inside his house in his presence.

“Tahir was continuously acting in a manner of supervising and motivating this mob. All these things were done to target Hindus. Every member of the mob assembled there participated in achieving the objective of targeting Hindus. Such conducts of the members of this mob, show that they were acting out of meeting of their mind and with a clear-cut objective in mind, to kill and harm Hindus. Thus, a criminal conspiracy to indulge into riot and to kill Hindus and harm properties of Hindus, is well reflected from the evidence on the record,” the court said.

It was submitted on behalf of Hussain that since it was an ongoing riot and conspiracy, he can be only said to have joined the conspiracy and could not be a conspirator for killing of Ankit Sharma.

Addressing the said contention, the court said:

“What would have been the liability of this bigger mob, had Ankit been fired upon and killed, with a firearm by one person from this mob? The obvious answer would be that if this firing would have been done in pursuance to common object of the mob, then every member of the mob would have been liable for consequence of such firing by virtue of S. 149 IPC. If this is so, then how does it make a difference when a group of around 20 persons from the so-called bigger mob caught hold of Ankit Sharma, dragged him to a place near pulia while assaulting him and then unknown number of persons kept beating and assaulting Ankit, followed by stabbing him by different persons from the mob till his death?”

Furthermore, the court observed that it was not necessary for all members of the mob to play some overt act in killing of Ankit Sharma and that as per evidence, the mob was acting in “well prepared manner” to attack Hindus and their properties, signifying existence of prior meeting of their mind.

“Tahir Hussain also played role of instigator to kill Hindus and exhorting this mob as to not to spare Hindus. He instigated the mob, when Ankit came forward towards this mob. The conspiracy need not be specifically to kill Ankit. When the accused persons were acting in pursuance to conspiracy and common object to kill Hindus, it covered killing of Ankit as well for the reasons that Ankit was killed because he was Hindu,” the court said.

The court also said that all the accused persons targeted Hindus and their acts were prejudicial to the harmony between communities of Muslims and Hindus.

They did disturb the public tranquillity as well, the judge said.