Plea in Delhi HC seeks to restrain authorities from separately classifying Markaz COVID-19 cases

A petition was filed in Delhi High Court on Friday seeking directions to restrain authorities from separately classifying coronavirus cases caused due to the Nizamuddin congregation as such reporting is causing hatred against a particular community.

The petition, filed by advocate MM Kashyap through advocates Fozia Rahman and M Qayam-ud-din, sought directions to Delhi Government to prohibit and stop the dissemination of coronavirus disease data on the basis of religious or communal classification.

The plea sought directions for taking strict actions against the sections of the social media spreading bigotry and communal hatred in relation to the Nizamuddin Markaz issue.

The petitioner also sought to identify the persons, media, websites, and domains, who are vilifying the Muslim community, promoting enmity, ill-will amongst the different religious groups and disturbing public order.

Kashyap, in his petition, sought directions for taking legal action and blocking social media handles with information that causes defamation and has communal classifications or informations pertaining to Markaz or Tablighi Jamat.

Expressing concern that such reporting may trigger communal antagonism, the petition said: "For that, the State of Delhi has recently witnessed one of the worst communal riots in its history and permitting the media to use the Tablighi Jamat incident to once again perpetuate communal hatred would risk the law and order situation in the entire state."

"It is submitted that the reporting of the Tablighi Jamat incident, in a way which demonizes the entire Muslim community, is likely to trigger communal antagonism and hatred resulting in fissiparous tendencies gaining a foothold, undermining and affecting communal harmony," it added.

The plea said that the nation is united in the fight against coronavirus but giving it communal colour would hamper the fight against this pandemic.

The petition also said that after the Markaj event, Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal in his tweets classified several affected cases under a separate caption -- "Masjid Markaz", which was wrong, unwarranted and unnecessary, deliberate and with mala fide intention.

( With inputs from ANI )