Muslim railman’s bias claim over fake ‘Allah’ bomb
A MUSLIM train driver sued a security firm for discrimination after it used a fake bomb with ‘Allahu Akbar’ written on it in a training exercise.
Anis Ali, 36, said the words ‘violated his dignity’ by connecting his religion with terrorism.
Mr Ali, who worked for Heathrow Express at the time, claimed he was discriminated against after he learned that the fake suspicious package planted to test security procedures had the Arabic words for ‘God is greater’ on it.
But an employment tribunal ruled that he was not discriminated against. Employment judge Laurence Anstis said it was unreasonable to take offence as ‘this phrase has been used in connection with terrorist attacks’.
Since the incident, Mr Ali, who now works for Great Western Railway, has been praised for his ‘selfless’ work as a volunteer with the NHS during the pandemic. To acknowledge the hundreds of hours he has given, his name was put up in lights in the Christmas display in Oxford Street, central London.
The tribunal in Reading was told that in August 2017 staff at Redline Assured Security Limited concealed a bag at a Heathrow Express station. The bag contained a cardboard box with electric cabling and a note with ‘Allahu Akbar’ written on it. Mr Ali was not on duty at the time but when he discovered the nature of the note ‘he considered this to violate his dignity and created a hostile environment for him’. The phrase was said to be ‘important and significant for Muslims’.
Mark Rutherford, of Redline, said: ‘The only purpose of the note is to ensure that the package looked obviously suspicious [...] to reflect just one of the current threats that were present in the UK at the time.’
Redline would also use English phrases in its fake suspicious packages, such as ‘Animal Testing must STOP now’ or ‘No Third Runway’, he added. Dismissing the claim, the judge
‘Violated his dignity’
said it was ‘legitimate’ for Redline to reinforce the suspicious nature of its packages by ‘referring to known threats and matters connected with previous terrorist incidents’.
But the tribunal decided that Mr Ali, from Morden, south London, had been discriminated against in two other incidents in which Sikh colleagues complained about him wearing ‘a Sikh kara bracelet’ despite being a Muslim.
One of them, duty station manager Davinder Hare, claimed Muslim men would wear a kara to attract and then rape Sikh girls. The tribunal ruled that Heathrow Express, Mr Hare and train driver Narinder Rai would have to pay Mr Ali a total of £4,000 for ‘injury to feelings’ on grounds of religious discrimination.