Class 12 Muslim student assaulted, paraded for talking to Hindu girl; arrested under POCSO : Valley Vision

A Muslim boy who is a class 12 student was arrested by Assam Police in Cachar district on Friday, hours after he was brutally beaten up by a mob of Hindu youngsters for talking to a female friend.

The boy was identified as Ali Ahmed, according to Scroll.

The assailants tied Ali’s hands, removed his shirt, and pulled him along by a rope while parading him in front of a crowd.

The incident took place near a higher secondary school at Narsingpur and the assailants accused him of “love jihad”.

On Friday morning, when Ali and the girl were talking to each other near the school, a group of boys from the Hindu community confronted him and asked his name.

“They asked my name and when I said Ali Ahmed, they started to beat me. There were 15-20 people. I don’t know them. Many more came later,” Ali told reporters after the police took him away from the location.

The two teenagers part of the assailant mob were classmates and studied in the same school till Class 10, said police.

According to viral videos, he was bleeding from the nose and mouth and was seen pleading for help, insisting, “there was no love relationship with her.”

The girl was also harassed and assaulted by the mob. Videos showed a woman pulling the girl’s hair while a group of men shouted in the background, demanding that she show her face.

Although no arrests were made in connection with the assault despite Ali’s family filing a complaint with the police, he was arrested based on a complaint from the girl’s family.

“The boy was arrested under the POCSO [Protection of Children from Sexual Offences Act] charges on the basis of the girl’s statement,” Scroll quotes Cachar Superintendent of Police Numal Mahatta as saying.

Even the police confirmed that the girl denied being in a relationship with Ali and acknowledged that they were classmates and studied at the same school until Class 10.

Ali’s family alleged that while the mob initially started beating him, the situation escalated after the intervention of the Hindutva group Bajrang Dal.

“Ali was arrested under the pressure from Bajrang Dal,” Ali’s uncle Rahum Uddin Barbhuyan told Scroll. “Despite my nephew being badly thrashed and there being video evidence, the police have not arrested anyone. This is outright injustice and discrimination.”