BHOPAL: First-time BJP MP from Bhopal Lok Sabha seat and 2008 Malegaon blast accused Pragya Singh Thakur has received a death threat over the phone from a man posing as the aide of India's most wanted fugitive gangster Dawood Ibrahim's brother Iqbal Kaskar.
The WhatsApp call to the BJP MP was made from the same phone number which was used for a similar death threat to ex-UP CM Mulayam Singh Yadav's younger daughter-in-law and UP BJP leader Aparna Yadav on Wednesday.
The caller posing as Iqbal Kaskar's man told Thakur through a WhatsApp call that she would be killed for targeting Muslims and spreading venom against the minority community.
A 2.05 minutes video showing the first-time lawmaker talking to the caller has gone viral over social media. A case has subsequently been registered on the BJP MP's complaint u/s 506 and 507 IPC against the unidentified caller at Bhopal's TT Nagar police station on Saturday morning.
Thakur received the WhatsApp call at around 1 am on Saturday, a short while after she had returned home from the BJP office in Bhopal.
In the viral video, the caller is heard telling Thakur that she would be assassinated soon for spewing venom against the Muslims, on which she asks the caller "do the Muslims sprinkle nectar. What did I utter that pained you?"
When she asked the caller, who is Iqbal Kaskar, the caller responded that she would come to know about it when she will be killed.
The death threat WhatsApp call happened just a few days after Thakur defended and suspended BJP national spokesperson Nupur Sharma for the latter's controversial remarks about Prophet Muhammad.
Primary investigations into the matter by Bhopal police revealed that the death threat call was made to Thakur from the same number which was used for a death threat to another BJP leader and ex-UP CM Mulayam Singh Yadav's daughter-in-law Aparna Yadav three days back, Bhopal police sources told The New Indian Express.
Three days back, a caller had through a WhatsApp call threatened to kill Aparna Yadav within 72 hours.
The common phone number from which death threats were made to Aparna Yadav and Pragya Thakur within three days was being operated from Dubai, sources privy to the ongoing investigations confided.
Further investigations are underway.