The Rajasthan government on Monday told the Supreme Court that it has written to online search engine Google to take down hate videos uploaded by a man accused of hacking and burning alive a Muslim labourer in the State in December 2017.
In the videos, Shambhu Lal Raigar was purportedly seen ranting that he killed Afrazul Khan, a labourer from West Bengal, to stop interfaith marriages. The killing was recorded on camera by Raigar’s minor nephew in Rajasthan’s Rajsamand district.
The State government told the apex court that these videos were hosted by multiple websites and it would take some time to remove them.
A Bench of Justices A.M. Khanwilkar and Ajay Rastogi asked the government to file an affidavit about the steps taken by it to remove the videos, including those uploaded by Raigar from inside Jodhpur jail, and adjourned the matter for further hearing. Senior advocate Indira Jaising, appearing for Khan’s wife Gulbahar Bibi, said the State government may have taken action with regard to the video uploaded by Raigar before his arrest, but no action has been taken about the video uploaded from inside the prison.