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Ashoka University Associate Professor Ali Khan Mahmudabad has been arrested for his comments about the press briefings on Operation Sindoor based on a complaint by a member of the Bharatiya Janata Party’s youth wing, his lawyer confirmed to Scroll.
Mahmudabad has been arrested under sections of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita pertaining to acts prejudicial to maintaining communal harmony, making assertions likely to cause disharmony, inciting secession, armed rebellion or subversive activities, and insulting religious beliefs.
The case was filed on Saturday at the Rai police station in the Sonepat district based on a complaint by Yogesh Jatheri, general secretary of the BJP’s Yuva Morcha in Haryana.
Earlier this week, the Haryana State Women’s Commission had summoned Mahmudabad, claiming that comments about the media briefings “disparaged women officers in the Indian armed forces and promoted communal disharmony”.
The commission’s chairperson Renu Bhatiya told India News that the professor ignored its summons on May 14. “On May 15, we visited the university, and were hoping that the registrar and vice-chancellor would call him there,” she said. “But he did not appear there either. We don’t think that we need any more proof.”
In a social media post on May 8, Mahmudabad, the head of the university’s political science department, had highlighted the apparent irony of Hindutva commentators praising Colonel Sofia Qureshi, who had represented the Army during media briefings about Indian military operations against terrorist camps in Pakistan and Pakistan-occupied Kashmir.
“Perhaps they could also equally loudly demand that the victims of mob lynchings, arbitrary bulldozing and others who are victims of the Bharatiya Janata Party’s hate mongering be protected as Indian citizens,” he had said.
Mahmudabad had said that the optics of the press briefings by Qureshi and Wing Commander Vyomika Singh were important, “but optics must translate to reality on the ground otherwise it’s just hypocrisy”.
The professor that his remarks had been “completely misunderstood” by the commission and that its notice failed to highlight how his posts were “contrary to the right of or laws for women”.
Mahmudabad added: “If anything, my entire comments were about safeguarding the lives of both citizens and soldiers. Furthermore, there is nothing remotely misogynistic about my comments that could be construed as anti-women.”
Ashoka University had said that the comments did not represent the opinion of the university.
Mahmudabad obtained his PhD from the University of Cambridge in the United Kingdom, and had previously studied at the University of Damascus in Syria and the Amherst College in the United States.
This article first appeared on Scroll.in
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