Sambhal, Uttar Pradesh: Idrissa Ghazi lay huddled in a blanket on a cot at the entrance of her two-room hut in a bylane of the Kot Garvi locality in Sambhal, Uttar Pradesh, shaking in anguish. 

The 60-year-old woman with a raspy voice and a turquoise-coloured shawl covering her sunken, ashen face yelled every few minutes.

“Lal, aa jaa mere laal. Kyun maara mere lal ko? (Beloved child, come back, my child. Why did you kill my child?)” 

Her son, 35-year-old Naeem Ghazi, who ran a mithai (sweetmeats) shop, was killed following the violence that broke out in the western Uttar Pradesh town of Sambhal on 24 November 2024. 

Naeem was among five Muslim men found dead after the violence in the state governed by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) since 2017, with Hindutva hardliner Yogi Adityanath at the helm as the chief minister. 

The violence erupted after Muslim protesters clashed with the police as a local court ordered a second survey of the 16th-century Shahi Jama Masjid—among the oldest surviving Mughal era mosques in the country, built in 1526—within five days of the first, without allowing the mosque committee to be heard.

Naeem Ghazi, Mohammad Bilal, Ayaan, Mohammad Kaif and Rumaan Khan died in the violence. 

Authorities claimed that the autopsy reports showed that the injuries on those killed were from “country-made weapons” and not caused by police ammunition, but locals said police shot them. 

Two weeks after the deadly violence, Sambhal’s superintendent of police, Krishan Kumar Bishnoi, told the media that two “warning shots” were fired in the air. 

The ruling BJP claimed the violence was caused by a “Turk versus Pathan rivalry” between local Muslims and the UP police said that US and Pakistan-made bullet cartridges were found at the site. 

The current member of Parliament from Sambhal, Zia ur Rehman Barq,  is from the Barq family which belongs to the Turk community, while member of the legislative Assembly, Iqbal Mehmood is a 'Pathan' or Khan. 

Both these political families are affiliated to Samajwadi Party. BJP and allied media are projecting the violence of 24 November as antagonism between these two Muslim communities. 

Surveys Of 4 Mosques

Sambhal’s district and sessions court ordered the survey on 19 November 2024 after a petition claiming that the Jama Masjid was built on the site of a temple devoted to Lord Vishnu’s avatar, Kalki. 

Since 2022, courts have ordered surveys of at least four Muslim places of worship to determine whether they were formerly temples. These include the Gyanvapi mosque in Varanasi, the Shahi Idgah complex in Mathura, the Kamal Maula mosque in Madhya Pradesh’s Dhar, and now Sambhal’s Shahi Jama Masjid. 

Hindu groups have also moved courts demanding similar surveys of the Jama Masjid in Budaun and Atala mosque in Jaunpur in Uttar Pradesh and the popular Ajmer Sharif dargah in Rajasthan: 18 suits laying claim to 10 mosques are pending, senior advocate Raju Ramachandran told the Supreme Court on 12 December 2024.

Such surveys and challenges violate the Places of Worship (Special Provisions) Act 1991, a law that forbids the conversion of any place of religious worship from one religious denomination to another. 

The Supreme Court constituted a unique bench to hear a set of petitions challenging this law in December 2024. On 12 December 2024, a three-judge bench led by the Chief Justice of India, Sanjiv Khanna, restrained courts across the country from admitting new suits or passing orders in any plea seeking a survey of mosques. 

In 2019, the Supreme Court pronounced that the Babri Masjid in Ayodhya was to be the only exception to the Places of Worship Act while handing it over to Hindus.

On 5 December 2024, former Supreme Court Justice Rohinton Nariman described the Babri Masjid judgement as against the “principles of secularism” and said surveys, such as the one ordered in Sambhal, were a “travesty of justice”. 

Even though the Ayodhya verdict pronounced in November 2019 made it clear that the Babri Masjid case was the only exception to the Places of Worship Act, a bench headed by the former chief justice of India, D Y Chandrachud, is regarded as having opened Pandora’s Box after making observations about surveying the site of the Gyanvapi mosque. 

In an oral observation, Chandrachud said that the 1991 Act does not bar “ascertaining the religious character of a place of worship”, with his comments now attracting scrutiny owing to the room it leaves for interpretations eroding the purpose of the Places of Worship Act. 

“We find today like hydra heads popping up all over the country, there is suit after suit filed all over the place,” said Justice Nariman while delivering the inaugural lecture of the Justice A M Ahmadi Foundation. “Now, not only concerning mosques but also dargahs.” 

The Sambhal petition, on 19 November, asked that the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) be mandated to manage and “have complete control” over the mosque site. 

On the same day, officials from the ASI, district magistrate’s office, sub-divisional magistrate’s office, and other local administrative authorities began to survey the mosque without giving the mosque committee a chance to be heard. 

Violence erupted when a second survey was carried out on 24 November amid cries of ‘Jai Shri Ram’. 

Five days later, on 29 November 2024, the Supreme Court stayed the local court’s survey order and asked the Sambhal trial court not to proceed with the case until the petition filed by the mosque committee was listed and heard by the Allahabad High Court. 

The apex court directed the UP government to maintain peace and emphasized that the UP administration should act “totally, absolutely neutral.” 

Following The CAA Playbook

What has ensued is a move borrowed from the playbook followed during a crackdown by the BJP government during the 2019 protests against India’s controversial Citizenship Amendment Act, the UP government said it would publicly “name and shame” protesters and recover damages from them. 

According to the police, at least seven first information reports (FIRs) have been registered, 40 have been arrested so far, and nearly 2,500 “unnamed” accused are mentioned, of which 300 have been identified. 

The FIRs include sections 3 and 4 of the Prevention of Damage to Public Property Act 1984,  pertaining to mischief causing damage to public property and mischief causing damage to public property using fire or explosive substances. 

They also include at least nine sections of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita 2023 (BNS), including provisions related to attempt to murder, voluntarily causing hurt or grievous hurt to deter public servant from duty, acts endangering the life or safety of others, and rioting. 

On 5 December, Sambhal district magistrate Rajender Pensiya said posters of 400 suspects accused of stone-pelting would be displayed publicly. They have not yet done so. 

In March 2020, the Allahabad High Court said the government’s action of putting up hoardings of the anti-CAA protesters was an “insult of the state and its public” and told them to take them down. 

But the BJP-led government persisted and appealed to the Supreme Court against the Allahabad High Court’s decision. 

The same month, the apex court told the UP government there was “no law” to back their actions and upheld the Allahabad High Court’s decision ordering removal of these posters. 

The district’s member of Parliament (MP) from the Samajwadi Party, Zia Ur Rehman Barq, and Sohail Mahmood, son of member of legislative assembly (MLA) Iqbal Mahmood, have also been booked for provoking violence. However, the Hindustan Times quoted Barq as saying he was in Bengaluru at the time of the violence. 

Three women—Rukaiya, Farhana and Nazrana—were also arrested on charges of stone-pelting and assault of police officials.

Article 14 also found at least three minor boys who were arrested and have presently been housed at the Moradabad juvenile shelter home. 

According to the Juvenile Justice Act 2015 and the Juvenile Justice (Care and Protection of Children) Model Rules 2016, no police officer can send a child into police lock-up or use any form of force or coercion. 

Police are required to inform the parents or guardians of the child that their child has been apprehended, disclose the address of the board where the child will be produced, and provide the date and time when the parents or guardians need to be present before the board. 

However, the mothers of the three minors said they were not even informed of where their sons were and found out themselves after repeated trips to the Nakhasa police station.

How Tensions Rose

It was when a second survey was carried out on 24 November that tensions arose in Sambhal, a town of 221,334 as per the 2011 census, 77.7% of them Muslim and 22% Hindu, known mainly for menthol production and a bone-and-horn handicrafts industry.

A culturally rich town boasting many artisans involved in this cattle horn and bone craftwork, Sambhal is adjacent to the industrial hub of Moradabad and part of the larger district of Sambhal. The district was recently in the news during the 2024 general elections when police reportedly stormed booths and prevented Muslim voters from casting their votes. 

The families of four of the men, Rumaan Khan’s being the exception, assert that gunshot wounds fired by the police killed them. 

The Moradabad divisional commissioner, Aunjaneya Kumar Singh, denied these claims in a press conference on 26 November 2024.

The police, too, denied these charges and said they only used tear gas and pellets. 

The chairman of the mosque’s caretaking committee, Zafar Ali, told the media that he saw the police firing bullets at the crowd. 

Ali was detained for police questioning soon after this statement and released later in the day.

Samajwadi Party’s leaders, including party president Akhilesh Yadav, also accused the police of firing at the mob. 

The complainants in two FIRs are police personnel: sub-inspector Shah Faisal (who claimed to have been attacked and his police vehicle set ablaze) and station house officer Anuj Kumar Tomar.

District authorities banned internet services in Sambhal and issued prohibitory orders forbidding the entry of outsiders into the district until 10 December 2024.

Claims Of Forced Burials & Coerced Complaints

In Idrissa Ghazi’s home, her family remains in shock about her son’s death. 

They said he set out to open his sweet shop early the morning he died. 

“By around 9 am, I got word that my son was shot dead,” said Idrissa. “Mere lal ke seene mein goli lagi (my beloved child was shot in the chest).”

She said they took him to the Sevenger hospital in Sambhal, which refused to admit him. 

“His brother, Tasleem, then took him to the government hospital and was beaten up by the police there,” Idrissa said, bursting into sobs. “They said ‘tum khud patharbaaz ho’ (you are a stone-pelter).” 

Naeem Ghazi’s younger brother Tasleem, 33 years of age, said he ran to his brother’s shop after hearing from locals that Naeem had been shot and saw him lying on the ground, bleeding. 

“I won’t forget how my brother said, ‘Haiye bhai main lutt gaya. Mere police ne goli maar di’ (Oh brother, I’m done for. The police have shot me),” said Tasleem. “He said this and fell unconscious.” 

Tasleem said he took his unconscious brother to multiple hospitals before he was declared dead, and they took his body home. He said the police then came to their house demanding the body be taken for a post-mortem.

“We accompanied the police to the hospital, and then I was kicked there by the CO (circle officer Anuj Chaudhary),” said Tasleem. “They refused to let us enter and called me a stone-pelter.”

Article 14 contacted CO Anuj Chaudhary on his official and personal numbers over the phone and via WhatsApp messages, seeking comment. There was no response. 

This story will be updated should he respond. 

“I had fallen to the ground seeing my brother like that. My clothes must have gotten dirty then,” said Tasleem. “The police said my clothes were dirty because I was out pelting stones. They then kicked me and refused to let me enter the hospital.” 

The family also alleged that the police returned Naeem’s body late at night, around 10:30 PM, and forced the family to bury him in haste. 

Idrissa said they were unable to “properly carry out the ghusl”, a ceremony involving washing and shrouding of the body before last rites. 

The allegations mirror those during the protests against the CAA in December 2019, when at least 23 Muslim youths were killed after police opened fire during the protests, and families claimed that they were forced to carry out hasty burials to cover up police excesses.

A copy of the FIR, numbered 0338/2024, accessed by Article 14, names an ‘agyaat bheed’ (unknown crowd) as responsible for Naeem’s death instead of the police, as alleged by the family. 

Tasleem and his mother said that at the time Naeem’s body was returned for burial, police forced Tasleem to put his thumbprint on their version of the complaint.

Tasleem said, “They wrote their own complaint to protect their own people.”

The family claimed that the police “brought in some local Muslims, who they said were related to us, but we have no clue who they were”.

Tasleem said the police claimed the death was due to “infighting between us Muslims and to hide the police role in this”. 

Naeem’s aunt Laeeqa said that at least 15 to 20 police personnel were present to coerce the family. 

“I don’t remember catching anyone’s name,” said Laeeqa. “But one said, ‘I will destroy your home and take away the women of this family if you don’t change your statement in the complaint.’”

‘Your Home Will Be Bulldozed’

Elsewhere in the neighbourhood of Turtipura Ilha, west Sambhal, a family living in a temporary house built with tarpaulin sheets lies in mourning and tells a similar tale of police repression and forced burial. 

Forty-year-old Aneesa could not contain her sorrow and showed a video of her son Mohammad Kaif selling plastic toys. 

On 24 November, the day he died, the 22-year-old Kaif had gone to the market near Jama Masjid to sell his wares. 

On hearing of the violence in the city, the family began looking for him. 

Aneesa, who goes by a single name, said before they could find him, police personnel stormed into their locality and beat up Kaif’s younger brother Zaid, 20, who was then taken to the police station and detained until the evening. 

Aneesa claimed that policemen threatened them and said, “Poore ghar par hum bulldozer chalva denge (Your home will be bulldozed),” when they protested Zaid’s detention. 

The family said they received a call late from the police in the afternoon informing them that Kaif had been shot dead. They then went to the hospital, where his body had been taken for a post-mortem.

“The police told us, ‘We are returning his body only on the condition that you sign this complaint and do not mention this to anyone’,” said Kaif’s uncle Mohammad Idris. “We were forced to put our thumbprint and sign. God knows what that complaint says.”

Idris and his sister Aneesa said they were still reeling in shock when they brought the body home, and despite the post-mortem being completed, several police officials accompanied them back.

“There were so many policemen at the time of conducting his last rites,” said Idris. “We had to carry out the burial in panic.” 

The families of Naeem Ghazi, Mohammad Kaif and Bilal insisted that the complaints registered as FIRs in their name were made under police coercion.

Rajiv Mohan, a Delhi-based criminal lawyer and former public prosecutor, said that according to section 174 of the erstwhile Code of Criminal Procedure and section 194 of the new Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita 2023, police and magistrates must order an inquest when a person dies of unnatural death, including homicide. 

Families of those killed said they had not received copies of post-mortem reports.

On 2 December 2024, Sanjeev Som, the Sambhal police public relations officer (PRO), said that they expected the proper postmortem reports to be out soon and that they would be shared with the families “as soon as we get them.”

Mohan said, “Even if a post-mortem report is given, it would only mention the cause of death and can’t identify the kind of bullet used or pinpoint it to the police.” 

Police Threats Alleged

In a narrow bylane of the Sarai Tareen, a neighbourhood of south Sambhal, Mohammad Bilal’s mother, Shehnaz Jahan, 45, said she saw her unconscious son injured on his leg and stomach. 

The 22-year-old Bilal, who was known by the single name, managed a clothes tailoring shop near the mosque and was headed to his shop when he was killed. 

Bilal’s older brother Salman, 24, told Article 14 that his brother could speak when he was rushed to Sambhal’s Hasina Begum hospital. 

“He told me that the police shot at him,” said Salman. “We were on the way to Moradabad when he died en route. Police took his body away for the post-mortem and gave it back to us at night.” 

Salman said later, when he attempted to register a complaint, he was threatened by the police. 

“The police came to our place at three in the morning, two or three days after his death and told us to take back our complaint,” said Salman. “This was all male police, and it was our mother who was going to answer the door. We refused to entertain them then.” 

Salman said the police returned the following morning. 

“We were forced to make another complaint, removing the police name,” he said.

When he opened his phone gallery, he displayed a blurry set of images showing a copy of his initial complaint and the final version.

“First, I had written that the public and police caused the firing and stone-pelting,” said Salman. “But the police mention was removed, and the complaint then just said that stone-pelting and firing happened, and he was shot.”

A closer reading of the two complaints shows that in the original one that Salman tried to register (in the photo below on the left), the eighth and ninth lines mention the words “police va public se pathrav va firing ho rahi thi"(there was stone-pelting and firing by the police and the public). 

However, in the version of the complaint that Salman was allegedly coerced into writing, the ninth line omits the mention of the police (in the photo below on the right side). It only says there was stone-pelting and firing but does not say by whom. 

Article 14 contacted the superintendent of police, Krishan Kumar Bishnoi, by phone and his official and personal WhatsApp number, seeking a response. Bishnoi did not respond. We will update this story if he does.  

Som, the PRO for the Sambhal police, said, “There is no such thing. These allegations are baseless.”

Som said that the last rites were carried out per the families’ wishes and added, “You already know that it’s the people’s job to blame the police.”

Minors Arrested

At least five minor boys are among the 40 arrested so far.

In a narrow lane next to the town’s famed Saint Jeelani public school, less than a kilometre from the mosque, a boy aged 13 manned a grocery kiosk. The child, Ali, had taken over from his older brother Mohammad Hussain, 15 years of age, after the latter’s arrest and detention in the Moradabad juvenile detention centre. 

On the morning that the violence broke out, Hussain had left home to buy vegetables and did not return. 

By afternoon, his mother, Shabnam, began to panic. 

“Most of the violence occurred in the Jama Masjid area, not our side, but when he stepped out at around 10 am that morning, he didn’t return, so I went outside looking for him,” the 38-year-old mother said. “I spent hours walking from one place to another, asking random passers-by about him.”

“Finally, I went to the police station at Nakhasa and found that he had been detained,” Shabnam added. 

Shabnam said she met the mothers of two more minor boys who had been arrested—Zaid (14) and Amaan (16)—at the police station. They, along with her son, are currently imprisoned in Moradabad juvenile home. 

“They are all being accused of stone-pelting, but my son was so far away from the locations where this violence occurred,” said Shabnam. “Even when I went to meet him at the juvenile home, I had to bribe the attendant with Rs 1000 just to meet my own son for five minutes.”

Shabnam is a single mother with two daughters and two sons. 

Her son Hussain helped manage the small kiosk that earned their family about 1000-1500 rupees a month. Her eldest child, Mahira Sadaf (22), is now the only breadwinner. She works as a cosmetics salesgirl and helps their family of five survive on her salary of about Rs 6000 a month. 

Mahira held up their shared family phone to show a photo of her brother and said, “He is such a small child. Does he look like a stone-pelter to you?”

Just two lanes away from their home is the house of 50-year-old Rukhsana. Both her sons—19-year-old Yameen and 14-year-old Zaid—were also picked up by the police on 24 November. 

Zaid was studying in the fifth grade, while Yameen, the only member of the family of five working full time, was an e-rickshaw driver. 

Rukhsana’s daughter Zeenat said that around five to six police personnel broke the door latch and barged into their home while she and her brothers were having a meal in the early afternoon. 

“They dragged my brothers outside and kept on saying that they are stone pelters,” said the 17-year-old Zeenat. “My brothers were at home throughout that day. How could they have pelted stones?”

The website Newslaundry reported that two minors, Hassan, 16, and Azim, 17, both admitted to the Sambhal civil hospital at the time, said the police had pressured them into signing off on complaints when were injured. 

Family members told Newslaundry that the police took the two boys to the Moradabad jail on 3 December—without prior notice or information to their families—even as both were treated for injuries at the TMU hospital ward. 

Women Imprisoned

Three women—named Farhana (32), Rukaiya (45) and Nazrana (21)—were also arrested on allegations of “stone-pelting” and “instigating violence against the police”. 

They were charged with multiple sections of the BNS, including sections of attempt to murder, assaulting or using criminal force to deter a public servant from discharge of their duty, and rioting. 

Farhana’s husband, Subhan, told ABP News that his wife and minor son were at home in the Hindu Khera locality in Sambhal at the time of the incident, and he was out at work. 

Subhan showed the TV reporter the damage inflicted on their property and belongings by the police, including dents on his motorbike and a scooter.

Glass panes, crockery, an LED TV, a fridge, and other breakable items are visibly smashed and strewn throughout the rooms. 

“My wife was on the phone with me. I instructed her to lock all the doors as we heard about stone-pelting, not to let anyone from outside enter our home,” Subhan told ABP news. “The police have all the CCTV footage of this area. They also took the DVR (digital video recorder) from my home. They can look into it and see who the real culprits are.” 

Farhana’s neighbour, the 21-year-old Nazrana, was also arrested. 

Back in her home, Nazrana’s mother, Sabriya, was still in shock as she pointed to a broken washing machine and shattered mirror, which she claimed were damaged by the police.

“I wasn’t at home when the police came. It was just my daughter and my daughter-in-law,” said Sabriya. “There was no man at home. They  all had gone to work, and my daughter-in-law told me no women police were present.” 

Sabriya claimed the police barged into their house and said, “Laao aadmi ko, kahaan hai tumhare aadmi? (Bring the men, where are your household’s men?)” 

Seven people live in their home, with Sabriya’s sons and husband working at daily wage jobs such as masonry and plastering. 

Sabriya told Article 14, “Dozens of media have come here to ask these questions, but will you bring back my daughter?”

A Divided City

The families of the dead and arrested are now unsure of their future, with many having lost their breadwinner. 

An eerie pall looms across the Shahi Jama masjid area even as restrictions have been lifted. 

The localities near the mosque also lie segregated—with Kot Garvi, home to primarily Muslim families less than 500 meters away from Kot Purvi, now dotted with saffron flags. 

And for those like Idrissa, who still mourns for her dead son Naeem, questions persist as to who will now look after her four grandchildren, aged between four and ten, and his wife, Tehzeeb. 

“He used to sell samosas to school children. What crime did my son commit?” said Idrissa. “His kids think he has gone to Delhi for treatment and will come back someday. How does one tell them?”

(Sabah Gurmat is an independent journalist and researcher based in New Delhi.)

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