A crowd of Hindutva supporters, allegedly members of Bajrang Dal, stormed a mosque-madrassa while disrupting congregational prayers by shouting hateful slogans in Uttarakhand.
The, incident shot on camera is said to have taken place in the Roshnabad area of Haridwar district in Uttarakhand on Friday, Clarion India reported.
“Basically, It took place at a Madrasa on Friday when people were offering Namaz,” said Manish Negi, Sub-inspector at Sidcul police station. “Muslims in large numbers, including non-locals, would gather there in large numbers for Friday Namaz and some people protested against it”
He said that the local police and administration officials including Sub-Divisional Magistrate arrived on the scene and pacified the situation. “It was a minor incident. We have not registered any case yet but are investigating the matter,” Negi said.
The video viral on Social media shows Hindutva supporters barging into the compound of the madrassa-mosque, shouting slogans like ‘Jai Shri Ram’, ‘Har Har Maha Dev’ and ‘Bharat Mata ki Jai’ in the presence of police officials.
Maulana Arif Qasimi, a member of Jamiat Ulema Hind, alleged that the disruption of the prayers was a preplanned incident. The Masjid is situated close to a forest in a Hindu-dominated locality where a handful of Muslim tribal families from the Gujjar community also live. They rear cattle for a living.
Qasimi said, “On Friday around 150 Hindutva supporters stormed inside the mosque-madrassa compound. They harassed and threatened the local Muslims and barged inside the mosque with their shoes and slippers on.”
Around the same time some officials of the local municipality, forest department and electricity department also reached the spot. “They cut the power supply to the mosque and forest officials took away the firewood that was lying there and warned of action,” Qasimi alleged.