‘Reports of Jamaatis demanding non-veg food in quarantine false’

NEW DELHI: The Saharanpur Police on Sunday said that they had investigated several media reports of "quarantined Jamaatis demanding non-vegetarian food and defecating in the open" and found that there was no truth to these reports. "The Saharanpur Police completely rejects the above-published news item," the police said in the statement, a picture of which was tweeted by their official Twitter profile.

A Hindi newspaper had initially carried the report, following which several local news channels had also broadcast the report, adding to the stigmatisation of Tablighi Jamaat members that began after reports of their Nizamuddin congregation in Delhi became public.

The Saharanpur Police said that it had directed the station in-charge of Rampur Maniharan to investigate the matter, following which it was revealed that these claims were fake.

These news reports had falsely claimed that quarantined members of the Tablighi Jamaat were demanding nonvegetarian food and throwing the food being provided to them. However, the police on Sunday said that some of the quarantined members had littered while eating from food packets and were then asked to use the dustbin.

The Police statement on the matter read as follows: “We wish to inform that we directed the police station in-charge of Rampur Maniharan to verify claims made by various newspapers, news channels and social media platform that Jamaatis had created a ruckus and defecated in public after they did not get non-veg food in quarantine. After investigation, it was found that the claims made by various newspapers, news channels and social media platforms were fake. Therefore, the Saharanpur Police completely rejects the above-published news items.”