Cong shares photo of killer with BJP leaders, party calls it fake news

A fresh row has erupted in the ghastly Udaipur beheading incident as the Congress on Saturday alleged that one of the main accused in the brutal killing of tailor Kanhaiya Lal is a “BJP member”. The BJP summarily dismissed it as “fake news”.

Allegations have been leveled upon the BJP that one of the killers Riyaz Attari also called Riaz Akhtari had links with BJP Minority Morcha leaders of Rajasthan.

The Congress has sought to know whether the Centre had moved quickly to transfer the case to the National Investigation Agency (NIA) due to the reasons that Attarri is seen in pictures with Rajasthan BJP leaders and wanted to join the party.

Addressing a Press conference at the Congress headquarters here, party’s media department head Pawan Khera said a very sensational disclosure has been made by a media group in connection with the Udaipur incident which pointed to the BJP links with Attari.

Some reports have also referred to the accused as Attari. “The killer of Kanhiya Lal, Attari is a member of the BJP,” Khera said in a tweet after the Press conference.

He cited pictures and posts linking Attari with the said BJP Minority Morcha  leaders — Irshad Chainwala and Mohammad Tahir.

“It has also come to the fore in the same disclosure that the main accused Attari often participated in the programmes of Rajasthan BJP leader and former Minister Gulabchand Kataria,” he alleged.

“Through the posts of BJP leader Irshad Chainwala on Facebook on November 30, 2018, and Mohammad Tahir on February 3, 2019, October 27, 2019, August 10, 2021, November 28, 2019, and other posts, it is clear that Attari was not only close to BJP leaders, but was also an active member of the BJP,” Khera alleged.

Questioning the “silence” of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah, the Congress leader asked whether the BJP and its leaders are trying to create an atmosphere of religious frenzy in the country.

“Is the BJP, through its spokespersons and leaders, trying to take advantage by polarising the country,” he asked.

Khera said Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot had welcomed the transfer of this case to the NIA.

The Centre has rushed a team of NIA to the Congress-ruled Rajasthan to probe the case and its possible foreign links, treating the killing as a case of “terrorism”.

Denying the murder accused’s alleged BJP links, the BJP’s IT cell chief Amit Malviya dismissed the claim as “fake news”.

“I am not surprised that you are peddling #FakeNews. The Udaipur murderers WERN’T members of the BJP. Their attempt to infiltrate was like the LTTE assassin’s attempt to enter the Congress to kill Rajiv Gandhi,” he tweeted.

“The Congress should stop fooling around with terror and national security,” Malviya said.

Tailor Kanhaiya Lal was killed on Tuesday afternoon by two cleaver-wielding men, who posted a grisly video of the crime online claiming responsibility for the murder.

The BJP Minority Morcha in Rajasthan also refuted the allegation levelled by the Congress that the main accused was a BJP member.

After a photo showing Attari with some local BJP leaders of Udaipur emerged, Mohammad Sadiq Khan, State president of the BJP Minority Morcha, said the photo cannot be held as proof to show he is a party member.

“Anyone can have a photo with any leader. It does not mean that he is a member of the BJP,” Sadiq told reporters.

“He might have gone to some programme of the party to carry out a recce and got photos clicked with local leaders. Since it is a normal trend to upload photos with leaders or celebrities on Facebook and other social media platforms, he might have also uploaded the photo but it does not mean that he is a BJP member,” Sadiq said.

He said the murder highlights the State Government’s failure as it did not provide security to Kanhaiya despite a clear threat. The BJP leader said the Congress wanted to shift the blame on the saffron party in order to divert public attention from the “failure of the Gehlot Government”, which he alleged did nothing for minorities in three-and-a-half years.

Sadiq said Attari’s vehicle number was “2611”, which he obtained by choice in 2013, and this indicated his radical ideology.