On 17 June 2019, 24-year-old Tabrez Ansari was attacked by a lynch mob in Jharkhand, India. He was tied to a tree, brutally beaten on suspicion of bike theft; Ansari, a Muslim, was also forced to chant Hindu sayings. He died several days later. The incident came to light after a video of the lynching went viral. India's Prime Minister commented on this lynching in the Parliament of India.
Events
Tabrez Ansari was an orphan. He lived in Pune and worked there for seven years. He visited his hometown of Kadamdih occasionally on festivals. For Eid al-Fitr he visited Kadamdih. During the visit, on 17 June, he went to Jamshedpur with two friends on the bike of one of his friends. While returning from Jamshedpur, he was caught in the village Dhatkidih, near Kadamdih. He was tied to a tree by the mob and brutally beaten on the suspicion of bike theft. While the mob was beating him, a video was made by an unidentified person in the mob. He was forced to say religious slogans such as "Jai Shri Ram" and "Jai Hanuman", which translates from Hindi to "hail Lord Ram" or "victory to Lord Ram". In the past, attacks and lynchings fueled by rumours on WhatsApp have occurred in India, where the fast propagation of fake news has led to violent outcomes. Often the fake news involve rumours of child kidnapping or roaming bandits. On the morning of 18 June, the police were notified. Ansari was arrested and locked up in Saraykela Police Station. His wife received a call from him telling her what had happened. She informed her relatives. His uncle visited the station and saw that he was severely injured. He asked the police to provide medical treatment, but Ansari was sent to prison without it. Two days later. when his uncle went to see him in prison, Ansari was not in any condition to talk. His uncle again contacted the police for medical help, but he was denied. He tried to reach the medical officer of the prison too, but was unable to meet him. On the morning of 22 June, Ansari's family received news that his condition was severe, and he was admitted to Sadar Hospital. His relatives reached the hospital by 7:30 am, but by that time, he had died.
Response
The Tabrez family demanded that the perpetrators be tried under Section 302 of the Indian Penal Code. Ansari's wife said that her husband was mercilessly beaten because he was a Muslim. She demanded justice. On 25 June, 11 arrests were made, and two policemen were suspended for "not reporting the seriousness of the issue to the higher authorities" and " a case of lynching on the very same day" An Special Investigation Team was assigned to investigate the case. The Saraikela-Kharsawan district police charged 11 of the 13 named accused in the case on 29 July. The murder charges were then dropped, but later reinstated. A medical panel of five members was formed to look into the death. The resulting medical report concluded that Tabrez Ansari suffered a skull fracture caused by a "hard and blunt object", a subarachnoid haemorrhage, and clotting of blood in the lower layer of the skull; and suggests that these injuries led to the cardiac arrest that resulted in Ansari's death. The consumption of poison was ruled out. On 9 September 2019, the police dropped the murder charges by giving cardiac arrest as the reason of death, which led to an uproar. Due to this, the police were accused of weakening the case. On 18 September 2019, the police filed a supplementary chargesheet after obtaining the opinion of a board of doctors of MGM Medical College and Hospital, reinstating the murder charges. The lynching resulted in public anger, debates on the use of "Jai Shri Ram" as an attack slogan and multiple protests, including one in New Delhi held near the parliament house, where protesters chanted slogans against the BJP and Prime Minister Narendra Modi and demanded an end to anti-Muslim violence. Modi commented on the lynching in parliament, that he was pained to hear about the incident and calling for "the strictest possible punishment to the accused". Rahul Gandhi, at the time President of the Indian National Congress, called the lynching a "blot on humanity". Vishwa Hindu Parishad called the lynching "a conspiracy of secularists", which VHP Joint General Secretary Surendra Jain blamed on "the Khan Market Mafia, which has repeatedly been maligning Hindu society, India and humanity."
