Yati Narsinghanand – one of the Hindutva preachers who addressed an event in Haridwar last month that called for the genocide of Muslims – was arrested on Saturday, becoming the second person to be taken into custody following an intervention by the Supreme Court.
Jitendra Narayan Singh Tyagi, who was Waseem Rizvi before he converted, was the first accused to be arrested in the hate speech case involving the Haridwar “Dharma Sansad” or religious assembly.
Over the last two weeks, the saffron-robed Narsinghanand has gone from cackling with cops about how a police officer “will be on our side” to cursing them – “all of you will die,” he said on Friday after the first arrest.
Narsinghanand is among more than 10 people named in the FIRs lodged over speeches that called for genocide and the use of arms against Muslims. Besides him and Tyagi, the police have also taken an interest in another religious leader Sadhvi Annapurna under immense pressure.
The first arrest in the case came nearly a month after the event, only after the Supreme Court on Wednesday directed the Uttarakhand government to submit an affidavit within 10 days on action taken in the case.
This report first appeared at NDTV
