Two AAP MLAs arrested in separate cases in Delhi

NEW DELHI/CHANDIGARH: Two MLAs of Delhi’s ruling party AAP were arrested on Sunday — one for allegedly trying to mow a woman down and another in a sacrilege incident in Punjab — taking to 11 the number of its legislators held by police in different cases.

The Arvind Kejriwal-headed Aam Aadmi Party(AAP) has 67 legislators in the 70-member Delhi assembly after it swept to power in February 2015. Amanatullah Khan was arrested by Delhi police after a woman alleged he tried to mow her down after she visited his residence to raise the issue of power cuts while a Punjab Police team on Sunday night arrested Naresh Yadav, who has been booked in connection with the alleged Malerkotla sacrilege incident on June 24. Both the arrests were made in Delhi.

Khan, also the chairman of the Delhi Waqf board, was first detained for questioning and then arrested, a day after he alleged at a press conference the woman was “pressurised” by police into giving a false statement against him.

“On July 22, the woman had recorded her statement before the magistrate under Section 164 of CrPC. She had alleged while she was returning from the legislator’s residence, a vehicle tried mowing her down and Amanatullah was sitting in it,” said Joint Commissioner of Police, Southeast Range, R P Upadhyay.

Prior to that, she had on July 19 filed a complaint with police alleging that at the AAP MLA’s residence in Jamia Nagar, a youth had on July 10 abused her and threatened that she would be killed if she did not stop politicising the matter. An FIR was subsequently registered in this regard.

After her statement to the magistrate, Section 308 (attempt to commit culpable homicide) was added to the FIR, the officer said.

“It is a non-bailable charge and we have arrested Khan,” Upadhyay said.

Reacting to Khan’s arrest, Arvind Kejriwal tweeted, “Modi ji arrests one more AAP MLA.”

Further, he tweeted in Hindi, “Anandiben in Gujarat sends Dalits and Patidars to jails in false cases, Modiji sends Delhiites to jails in false cases. Delhi and Gujarat will now fight together”.

Punjab Police IG (Patiala Zone) Paramraj Singh Umra Nangal said in Chandigarh, “We have arrested AAP MLA Naresh Yadav from his house in Delhi. He will be produced in the Malerkotla court on Monday.”

Earlier, he said that a team of Punjab police was despatched to Delhi to arrest Yadav.

Umra Nangal said an arrest warrant was procured from a local court to arrest Yadav.

Yadav was booked after one of the accused, Vijay Kumar, arrested in connection with the incident, He has been charged under IPC sections 109 (punishment for abetment if the act abetted is committed in consequence and where no express provision is made for its punishment), 153A (promoting enmity between different groups on grounds of religion, race, place of birth etc and doing acts prejudicial to maintenance of harmony), 295 (injury or defiling place of worship with an intent to insult the religion of any class).
The Mehrauli MLA and his party have denied the charges and alleged it was a “political conspiracy” to malign the party’s image ahead of Assembly polls in Punjab.

claimed he had done it at the behest of the AAP MLA.