JAIPUR: The role of the police is under the scanner in the case involving a khadim of the Ajmer Dargah threatening to kill Nupur Sharma for insulting Prophet Muhammad. Salman Chishti was arrested soon after his video went viral.
Officiating Director General of Police Umesh Mishra said on Thursday that Rajasthan Police service (RPS) officer Sandeep Saraswat was removed last night and the inquiry against him will be conducted by the police's vigilance branch.
Salman Chisti, caretaker of the Ajmer dargah, had in a video offered his house to anyone who beheads Sharma for her controversial remark against Prophet Mohammad.
He was arrested from his house in Khadim Mohalla in Ajmer late on Tuesday.
However, in another clip, a policeman escorting him is heard telling Chishti that he would be “saved if he admits he was drunk” when making the video.
The clip involving the cop was purportedly made when the khadim was presented before a court.
The BJP has alleged that the cop’s view reflects the appeasement policy of the Congress government, drawing a rejection from the latter that called the accusation as absurd.
The video showing officer Saraswat with Chisti surfaced on social media, prompting the Rajasthan Police to remove him from his posting.
BJP MLA from Ajmer North Vasudev Devnani shared the video clip on Facebook and dubbed Saraswat's action "height of appeasement by the Rajasthan government".
"The police are explaining to a criminal 'Bol dena nashe me tha' (say you were intoxicated) so that he is saved. It is Ashok Gehlot's police who are saving Khadim Salman Chishti of Ajmer Dargah who asked for Nupur Sharma's neck. We thought the culprit would be punished. Kanhaiya Lal was not given security by the Rajasthan Police," he wrote in Hindi along with the video.
Chisti, meanwhile, remains in police custody.
Police officer Sandeep Saraswat involved in the “conversation” with Chishti was shunted out on Wednesday.
Saraswat later said the video was “correct”, but incomplete. Salman is a habitual criminal as well as a drug addict.
“Arresting him from the Khadim locality was difficult. His house was raided late at night. We kept talking to him as he was brought to the police station. I had no evil intention,” Saraswat apparently told his seniors.
Meanwhile, the Jodhpur police on Thursday arrested an advocate's clerk for allegedly threatening to chop off the head of a colleague for posting a WhatsApp status supporting Nupur Sharma over her controversial remarks on Prophet Mohammad.
The accused, Sohail Khan, started threatening the complainant, Mahendra Singh Rajpurohit, soon after he posted the WhatsApp status on June 6, police said.
The principal seat of the Rajasthan High Court reopened after summer vacation on Monday and Khan threatened Rajpurohit again.
Following this, Rajpurohit lodged a complaint and Khan was arrested, they said.
Sharma's remarks on the Prophet during a TV debate triggered protests across the country and drew sharp reactions from many Gulf countries.
The BJP subsequently suspended her from the party.
In a similar incident, an advocate's clerk was booked for allegedly sending an objectionable message in a WhatsApp group on the murder of a tailor in Udaipur, the police said.
The accused was identified as Vikram Singh, they said.
Singh sent an objectionable message in a WhatsApp group of advocates' clerks on July 1 but instantly deleted it, saying that he forwarded it by mistake, according to police.
Later, Singh's colleague Nadeem confronted him over the message and lodged a complaint against him.
Both are advocates' clerks in the Rajasthan High Court's Jaipur bench, the police said.
Singh filed a petition in the high court seeking quashing of the FIR registered against him.
A single-judge bench of Justice Birendra Kumar heard the plea on Wednesday and stayed Singh's arrest.
It also directed the police to provide security to Singh and his family.
"The petitioner shall not be arrested in the aforesaid FIR till further orders with conditions that petitioner shall fully cooperate with the investigation of the case.
"The state respondents are directed to ensure protection to (of) the life and liberty of the petitioner and his family which cannot be at stake otherwise than due process established by law," the court said in its order.
A tailor, Kanhaiya Lal, was hacked to death on June 28 by two men, Riaz Akhtari and Ghouse Mohammad, with a cleaver at his shop in Udaipur's Dhan Mandi area to avenge an "insult to Islam".
(With PTI Inputs)