On Saturday (April 3), the Uttar Pradesh police submitted a 5000-page charge sheet against Kerala-based ‘journalist’ Siddique Kappan and 7 others for conspiring to create communal tension in Hathras. He was arrested by the UP Police on October 5 while he was proceeding to cover the Hathras case.
As per reports, the charge sheet was filed before the Additional District Judge’s Court in Mathura. Besides Siddique Kappan, radical Islamist outfit PFI members Masood Ahmed, Rauf Sharif, Ansad Badruddin, Atiqur Rahman, and Firoz Khan were also booked by the Uttar Pradesh Special Task Force (STF). The last date for filing the charge sheet was Sunday (April 4).
Siddique Kappan has been charged under the stringent Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, Indian Penal Code (IPC) Sections 124A (sedition), 153A (promoting enmity between different groups), 295A (hurting sentiments) and relevant sections of the Information Technology Act. In his defence, his lawyer has argued that Kappan was doing his job as a journalist to cover the sensational Hathras case.
ED had filed charge sheet against Siddique Kappan
In February this year, the Enforcement Directorate (ED) had filed a chargesheet against Siddique Kappan in a money laundering case. Besides Kappan, the ED had also filed cases against five other office bearers of radical Islamist outfit PFI (Popular Front of India) and CFI (Campus Front of India) in connection to the money laundering case.
The Enforcement Directorate has stated in its charge sheet that Siddique Kappan, CFI leader Rauf Sherif and other accused collected overseas funds to the tune of ₹1.36 crores and sent it back to India through fraudulent transactions. The ED emphasised that the money was used to fund anti-CAA protests, and violence during the Anti-CAA riots.
Siddique Kappan hailed Osama bin Laden as ‘martyr’
The Uttar Pradesh government had submitted a copy of a front-page story by Kappan in Thejas, dating back to November 30, 2011, wherein he claimed that Al-Qaeda terrorist Osama bin Laden was a ‘martyr’. The government revealed that Siddique Kappan was the mastermind of several riots, who in collusion with Thejas Editors, wanted to create religious unrest in the state of Kerala