Hand Chop- Chargesheet against 27 Taliban terrorists of Popular Front

Attack on Prof: Chargesheet against 27 Islamists
VR Jayaraj | Kochi – Daily Pioneer

The Kerala Police on Friday filed chargesheet against 27 Islamists belonging to the Popular Front of India (PFI) and its political wing Social Democratic Party of India (SDPI) in the case related to the Taliban-model attack on TJ Joseph, a college professor.

Though the police listed 54 Islamists, all from the PFI and SDPI, as accused, the chargesheet was against 27 only. A separate chargesheet would be filed against the remaining 27 later. The police hastily submitted the chargesheet in the context of several of the accused getting bail as they had completed 180 days in judicial custody.

All the 27 accused were charged with anti-national activities, criminal conspiracy, unlawful assembly for illegal activities, incitement of religious hatred and other offences. The chargesheet said that the PFI and SDPI activists had indulged in extremist activities with the intention of creating anarchy by destroying the peace prevailing in the society.

The chargesheet, filed in the Ernakulam Additional Sessions Court in Kochi, leveled serious charges against the Islamist outfit and its political wing, saying that their activists had acted like terror gangs by attacking the professor. It said about 100 PFI-SDPI activists had tried to sabotage the police’s probe into the incident.

The Islamists had cut off the right hand of Prof Joseph of Church-run Newman College, Thodupuzha in a dawn attack at Muvattupuzha in Ernakulam district on July 4 last for preparing a question paper that allegedly blasphemed Prophet Muhammad. The Catholic management of the college later suspended Prof Joseph for the same reason.

Responding to reports on the chargesheet, Prof Joseph said his only interest in the case presently was that the law should take its course. “I had pardoned the assailants in my mind long back. The police would do their work. I don’t see this case as a personal matter anymore,” he said.

The first accused in the case, as per the chargesheet, was PFI activists Sawad of Kothamangalam, who had cut off the professor’s hand. The first seven accused were Islamists who had taken part in the attack on the professor when he was returning home from a church in Muvattupuzha after Sunday mass.

PFI’s State-level leader MK Nasser of Aluva, the chief conspirator behind the attack was listed as 28th accused in the 600-page chargesheet. However, the charges against him would be specified only in the chargesheet to be submitted later along with those against 26 others. Nasser was yet to be arrested.

The others among the 27 chargesheeted on Friday included Jaffar Sikkander Ali of Muvattupuzha, Ashraf of Kalady, Ali, Sjiyas Muhammadali and Yunus of Kothamangalam, Abdul Lateef of Malappuram, Anas of Vazhakulam who while in custody won a local body election and Abdul Salam of Aluva.

In the chargesheet, the police said that the attack on the professor was carried out with the intention of sending a warning that any act against the Islamists’ faith would be severely dealt with. The PFI-DYFI activists had tried to incite communal hatred through the attack and upset religious harmony, the police said.

The chargesheet said that the Popular Front and SDPI had tried to derail the investigations by organizing marches to the police station, laying siege to it and trying to intimidate the investigating officers. The chargesheet listed 255 persons as witnesses among whom seven were eyewitnesses.

In an indirect reference to the Catholic management of the college which suspended him from service after the brutal Islamist attack on him, Prof Joseph said the actual culprits who should be punished and who were disrupting religious harmony were those who still thought he had committed blasphemy.

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