Assam Police held MLA Aminul Islam over controversial audio clip about COVID-19

STAFF REPORTER

GUWAHATI: Assam Police formally arrested MLA Aminul Islam of the All India United Democratic Front (AIUDF) at Nagaon town in the wee hours on Tuesday. Earlier on Monday night, police had first detained the legislator at the Nagaon Police Station and quizzed him on his reported controversial audio clip. As customary, police have also informed the Assembly Speaker of the development.

Meanwhile, the legislator was remanded to 14-day judicial custody by a Court in Nagaon on Tuesday.

Meanwhile, Nagaon Superintendent of Police (SP) Abhijit Gaurav Dilip told mediapersons on Tuesday, “MLA Aminul Islam has been booked on three charges. His audio clip is not only communal but has also posed questions on the secularism of the Government of India. Besides, he has spread misinformation about COVID-19. The legislator was interrogated on the basis of a complaint filed by a person over the audio clip.”

During interrogation, the legislator confessed that he himself had produced the audio clip and also that he uploaded the clip to a number of persons from his own mobile phone, the SP said, adding, “We’ll trace out the persons to whom he had uploaded the clip.

“We have seized his mobile phone, and also found the recording of the audio clip there. So a case has been registered against him. The Case number is 877/220 IPC 120 (B) 150 (A), 124 A) and 129 (A).”

The Opposition MLA of Assam “made controversial comments about the situations of quarantine facilities and hospitals for coronavirus patients” in the State, police said.

According to the police, AIUDF MLA Aminul Islam had said that the conditions in the quarantine facilities are “worse than in detention centres for the people”.

The legislator, elected from the Dhing Legislative Assembly constituency in Assam’s Nagaon district and known for incendiary remarks in the past too, also had earlier accused the Bharatiya Janata Party-led government in Assam of “conspiring against Muslims”.

He also alleged that the medical staff at the quarantine centres have been harassing the people who had returned to Assam after attending from last month’s religious congregation at a mosque in Delhi’s Nizamuddin area.

“The health staff were giving injections to healthy individuals to show them as sick and coronavirus patients,” he had alleged, as per the police.

The AIUDF, a local party with a strong base among the Muslims, has 14 MLAs in the 126-member Assam Assembly.

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