LUCKNOW – In more trouble for senior Samajwadi Party leader Azam Khan, theUttar Pradesh Police on Tuesday filed a chargesheet against him forallegedly making derogatory remarks against Army.
The chargesheet against the SP leader was filed in Moradabad nearly a weekafter the Yogi Adityanath government gave its go-ahead to the police topress charges against Khan, Zee News has reported.
The Yogi Adityanath government gave its approval nearly a year after Khanmade the alleged insulting remarks on Indian Army.
“The administration has granted the approval to file a chargesheet againstformer Uttar Pradesh minister Azam Khan against whom a police complaint wasfiled for his press statement against the Indian Army on June 27, 2017,”Rampur Additional Superintendent of Police Sudha Singh had told thereporters.
A complaint against Khan was filed by Akash Saxena, son of a BharatiyaJanata Party (BJP) leader under Sections 153A and 505 (statements conducingto public mischief) of the Indian Penal Code in connection with hisprovocative speech made last year.
Apart from Saxena’s complaint, three other complaints were also registeredagainst Khan over his controversial remark against the Indian Army.
Addressing a meeting of party workers in Rampur, Khan had said that ”womenterrorists had been chopping off private parts of Army personnel in orderto send a strong message that should leave the entire nation ashamed.”
Khan later claimed that his statement was misconstrued by the media andapologised for his remarks. But, several complaints were filed against himby then.
Based on the complaints, the police lodged a case on June 30, 2017, andsent a CD with Khan’s speech as evidence for forensic analysis.
The forensic verification confirmed that the CD was authentic.
However, this was not the first time that the SP leader had madecontroversial remarks. On several occasions in past, Khan had made highlycritical remarks against the Narendra Modi-led BJP regime and over thefunctioning of its top ministers.