A report published by the Independent newspaper said that a court in Delhi acquitted 12 men from the murder of two Muslim brothers during the riots in 2020, which resulted in the killing of 53 others.
The report confirmed that the bodies of Amer and Hashem Ali were found in a stream in the Bahjirithi area on February 27, 2020, after their news was cut after a phone call from Amer to his father, in which he said, “We are close and we will come back soon.”
It is noteworthy that the actions of sectarian violence witnessed by the northeast of Delhi 5 years ago, during which the Hindu gangs surrounded Muslim societies, and they burned homes, stores and mosques in what the survivors and human rights groups described since then the massacre.
(British press)
Ruling
The report indicated that the court dropped the charges from the 12 men because of the “absence of conclusive evidence”, despite the police relied on WhatsApp messages as a guide, including a message attributed to the accused Lukish Kumar Solanki, in which he stated in the Indian language that “your brother (in reference to himself) killed two Muslims near Bahjurathi about nine o’clock in the evening, and threw them in the course.”
Judge Plastic Pramashala insisted that “the messages showed a shine, not confession”, and that “it lacks support with material evidence or reliable witnesses”, and Solanki was condemned to incite hatred, not killing.
The judge wrote in his ruling that “the content of the digital conversations does not prove direct participation in the killing, but rather indicates the provocation of sedition only.”
The report stated that the court considered the inability of witnesses to identify the defendants as a major reason for their acquittal, and the judge said: “A continuous series of facts must be excluded every other interpretation.”
The report indicated that the family of the dead lives in a narrow house in Mustafaabad and sometimes earns only 500 rupees per day, which makes the judicial battle difficult.
He added that the court also acquitted accused in the case of the killing of another Muslim youth named Shahbaz, which was burned by a Hindu group until the bones of his body were broken, and the charges were dropped because of the lack of witnesses to confirm the identity of the perpetrators.
“Part of me died with them”
The report reviewed the repercussions of the “brutal” murder on the father of the two young men, Babo Khan, who said with a broken voice that he searched for them throughout the night, and the next morning we went to the police station, we called us to get to know 3 bodies, and there I saw my son. “
The forensic report revealed that Amer was subjected to 25 injuries, including horrific burns, and that his death was due to a shock caused by a deadly header in the head.
The newspaper quoted that Khan stopped talking to a moment while he was telling his story, and staring at the wall as if time stopped, then he continued that his life turned into hell from that night, and that he is struggling with death every day, “for whom I complain?
Amer was -According to the report- He works as a driver with delivery applications while Hashem was selling clothes, and Khan commented: “My son did not harm anyone, they were kind to help people, I do not understand how some people could find pleasure in killing, part of me died with them.”
Amer left behind 3 daughters, the youngest of whom was still in the womb of her mother when he was killed, and Khan asked with a suffocating voice, “What do we say to them?