Aam Aadmy Party’s Okhla MLA, Amanatullah Khan, accused the officers from Delhi police’s special cell of attempting to create Batla House encounter like situation in Okhla area of Delhi in the early hours of Thursday.
At around 2.30 am on Thursday, Amanatullah said on Facebook that three officers from the special cell had arrived in R Block of Jogabai at around 2 am before harassing the local residents by invading their privacy inside their houses.
His Facebook post said, ” Hari Om, Shashi and Namrata were abusing people under the influence of alcohol and barging inside their houses in R Block of Jogabai at around 2 am. These officers kept shouting that the terrorists had taken refuge here. I was called by hapless residents, but seeing me on the spot most of them fled. We, however, managed to catch three of them.”
Khan, who also posted photos of the police officials, alleged that these special cell officers were roaming in the neighbourhood without the local police adding that they wanted to create communal strife just before the planned hanging of Yakub Memon.
“Had it not been for my intervention, perhaps tomorrow morning’s newspapers’ headlines would have been something like this ‘some terrorists killed in police encounter,'” Khan alleged.
He also accused the BJP of orchestrating a communal tension in the area.
In September 2008, Delhi police had killed two Muslim youths in Okhla’s Batla House area on the suspicion of being terrorists in an encounter. This had caused huge political row with questioning the police’s version of the story.
Okhla, a predominantly Muslim neighbourhood of Delhi, has always been communally sensitive. Last year, some miscreants had placed the head of a pig inside a mosque and Amanatullah’s role in averting a potential riot with the help of the imam and local elders was hailed by all and sundry.