Days after family home razed, Afreen says will not be silenced

Javed and Fatima are members of the Welfare Party of India — she is national secretary of the Fraternity Movement, the student wing of the Welfare Party. Javed was arrested as one of the alleged co-conspirators of the June 10 violence over suspended BJP leader Nupur Sharma’s comments on the Prophet.

At a press conference Thursday organised by the Fraternity Movement, Fatima appeared via Zoom and said, “I stand in absolute solidarity with all Muslim families whose houses have been demolished… Whatever has happened with my father, Janaab Javed Mohammed Sahab, and with my family and to our house, is known to everyone.”

Bulldozers outside the house of Afreen Fatima and Mohammad Javed. (PTI Photo)

She said her family was “privileged” and her “heart aches for those who are not so privileged and whose houses were broken”.

“No matter how much you try to scare and threaten us, or trouble us by putting us in jail, we will not keep quiet or be silenced, nor are we going to disappear from this country,” she said.

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Fatima maintained that her father was “completely innocent”.

Javed’s wife Parveen Fatima also issued a statement saying the charges against her husband were “baseless” and the family’s priority was to “prove his innocence and ensure his release”.