Ten Given Jail Terms over Torture, Lynching of Muslim Man in India
The man died after being tortured and forced to chant Hindu slogans.
Tabrez Ansari was tied to a pole and tortured for 12 hours in 2019, as he cried and pleaded with a mob that accused him of burglary in the eastern state of Jharkhand.
A video of the incident that spread on social media showed the 24-year-old being forced to chant “Jai Sri Ram” – meaning “hail Lord Ram” – a slogan widely used by Hindu hardliners.
Police later detained Ansari for theft while he was in critical condition, and took him to hospital days later, where he died while in custody.
Following a public outcry, police arrested 12 Hindu men, two of whom were later acquitted due to lack of evidence.
The remaining 10 were convicted last week of culpable homicide not amounting to murder, and each handed 10-year prison sentences on Wednesday.
Ansari’s wife, Shaista Parveen, said she would appeal against the sentence in order to increase it. “I respect the court order, but I am not fully satisfied with it. We will approach higher courts for justice,” she told AFP.
India’s prime minister, Narendra Modi, who has been criticized for not speaking out against Hindu extremists’ violence against Muslims, has said he was “pained” by Ansari’s murder.
Modi’s Hindu nationalist government has been accused of turning a blind eye to a rising number of vigilante attacks on minority Muslims.
Rights groups say Hindu mobs have been emboldened under the rule of Modi’s Bharatiya Janata party, which came to power in 2014.
Source: The Guardian
