Family of 22-yr-old jailed for post on UP CM says he was framed by hate mongers
The family of Rahat Khan, arrested and jailed for his alleged offensive Facebook post on Uttar Pradesh chief minister Yogi Adityanath, could explore legal options to get him released on bail.
The 22-year-old man — a high school dropout who earns his living from a Jan Suvidha Kendra in Greater Noida’s Dankaur — was arrested late on Thursday for allegedly posting the Yogi’s morphed photograph with an insulting caption that questioned the BJP chief minister’s integrity. A court sent him to prison on Friday as police didn’t seek his custody.
“He has posted on Facebook a morphed image with an offensive caption,” said Rajpal Tomar, the station house officer of Dankaur police station.
He alleged that objectionable materials have been found in Khan’s mobile phone, which police had confiscated for investigation.
Khan was picked up on a complaint from members of the Hindu Yuva Vahini, a youth group founded by the Yogi.
Complainant Naveen Sharma, a BA student and member of the Hindu group, said he lodged a police complaint after he went through the “derogatory Facebook post” against Adityanath. “The chief minister is an idol for many. I then complained to police.”
Khan’s family countered the allegations, saying he was framed by hate-mongers.
“Our family has been fighting for several social causes, which is not liked by some hardliners. They are trying to harass us by any means,” said Kadir Khan Jayswal, the arrested man’s uncle.
Khan’s earns about ₹10,000 a month from the Jan Suvidha Kendra, which he has been operating for the past two years. His father is a welder at Jaypee Sports City in Dankaur, and his mother is a housewife. He has four siblings.
“It is a conspiracy by the land mafia. We approached Dankaur police against the suspects, but they refused to take our complaint,” his brother, Anjaan Ali, said.
The family is involved in a property dispute with the Waqf board. The Khans had moved a writ petition against the Islamic board before the Allahabad high court.
The family is now trying to move an application to bail Khan out of jail.
The action against Khan came close on the heels of police arresting four people in Uttar Pradesh for allegedly posting and sharing on social media “objectionable pictures” of Adityanath.
These arrests were made in Varanasi, Ghazipur, Sonbhadra and Bareilly districts, police said.
The 44-year-old Adityanath, known as a ‘firebrand Hindu leader’, is the head priest of Gorakhpur’s influential Gorakhnath shrine and a five-term parliamentarian.
The BJP leadership chose to make him the chief minister after the party and its allies won a landslide victory — with 325 seats — in the February-March assembly elections in the country’s most populous state. The Yogi was sworn in last Sunday to head a BJP government in Uttar Pradesh in 15 years.