8-yr-old Muslim kid wasn’t a victim of lynching

People gathered at the mosque after an eight-year-old student of a Madrasa died after he sustained a head injury | Burhaan Kinu/Hindustan Times via Getty Images

AAP MLA Somnath Bharti says no religious angle in death, was the result of a dispute over a game.

New Delhi: The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) MLA from Malviya Nagar, Somnath Bharti, Sunday said that the death of an eight-year-old madrasa student was the result of an altercation over a playground issue and had no religious angle to it.

“There were people who immediately got into action and tried to give it a communal twist that it was not,” Bharti told ThePrint. “A thorough examination of the CCTV footage clearly shows that it was a fight over a game.”

Mohammad Azeem, an eight-year-old from Haryana, who was staying at the madrasa in Malviya Nagar, died Thursday after sustaining injuries in a scuffle between children from the Muslim seminary and boys from the nearby Balmiki camp basti.

There was tension in the area following the incident but local residents, along with Bharti, took charge of the situation and held multiple meetings with both the communities.

Bharti said it took two days to calm the environment and establish peace in the area. “We also got Amanatullah Khan (the AAP MLA from Okhla) to get involved and help in bringing peace to the area,” he said.

Bharti also alleged that a minority wing member of the Loktantrik Janata Dal, the outfit newly launched by Sharad Yadav, tried to instigate Muslims to pick a fight with the residents of the nearby J.J. colony. “He got involved and was making every attempt to charge the environment,” Bharti said.

Scuffle over disputed property

The altercation between the boys of both communities was over disputed land outside the madrasa. The residents of the slum claim it to be government land while the madrasa claims it to be its property.

A group of boys from the madrasa were playing on it when another group of boys from the slum reached there and asked them to move away as they wanted to play.

In the scuffle that followed, Azeem was pushed onto a parked motorbike, on which he hit his head and died.

The AAP-led Delhi government has announced a compensation of Rs 5 lakh to his family.