Unrelated video of Domestic Violence from Karnataka Shared Falsely as Love Jihad…

Byline – As the country continues to digest the gruesome details emerging out of the investigation of Shraddha Walkar’s murder, an old and unrelated video is being shared to add fuel to the narrative of Love Jihad on social media.

Shraddha Walkar, a 27-year-old woman was allegedly killed by her partner Aftab Amin Poonawala in Delhi. After murdering Shraddha, Aftab allegedly chopped her body into 35 pieces and threw them in a forest. Based on the complaint by the victim’s father, police have arrested the accused and investigation is underway. The accused has also confessed to the crime.

As the chilling details of this gruesome incident emerge, the society is filled with anger and rightfully outraging against this brutal murder. However, some have communalized this incident and claimed it to be Love Jihad.   

As a result, Shraddha Walkar and Aftab Poonawala have been trending on Twitter since the past few days. Some tweeps have shared other instances where the accused was Muslim and the victim was from the Hindu community and alleged all these unrelated cases show a pattern of growing ‘Love Jihad’ in the society.

Among these, one user shared the video given below and claimed the woman seen in the video is a victim of Love Jihad. The man can be seen brutally assaulting his wife as they celebrate their son’s birthday.

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In the video, a person can be seen demanding harshest punishment for the husband. He claims the name of the perpetrator is Mohammed Mushtaq and he is from Bengaluru. However, let us find out the details of this video and find out the real story behind this incident.

Fact Check

We did a keyword search on Google using keywords related to the incident and found details about the incident. We found an article by India Today, which says the incident shown in the video is an old incident. The name of the victim is Ayesha, who is now separated from her abusive husband. In a video posted by an influencer on Instagram, Ayesha thanks everyone and opens up about the case.

Ayesha also reveals that she is fighting multiple cases in the court seeking divorce from her ex-husband. She says she is thankful that her video was made viral and she did not share this video before because she felt humiliated. The video had went viral last month and it also caught the attention of the head of Delhi Commission for Women, Swati Maliwal. Swati Maliwal also wrote a letter to the Karnataka Chief Minister, Basavaraj Bommai and demanded justice for the survivor. 

On Dec 28, last year, Karnataka High Court had quashed the petition of Ayesha’s husband and directed him to pay compensation while awarding the custody of the minor child to Ayesha. As per News18 report, “A Muslim wife can retain the exclusive custody of her minor child when she can stay away from her matrimonial house on the grounds of her husband’s second marriage,” said Justice Krishna S Dixit.

The judgment order said, “An argument, on the contrary, would permit an unscrupulous husband, who contracts another marriage, to pressurize his first wife to continue in the matrimonial home, eventually retaining the child in his exclusive custody. This court is of the considered view that even the visitation rights of such a father will diminish to a great extent”. 

You can read the entire judgment order by clicking on this link. 

Conclusion

From the investigation, it is clear that the accused and the victim are from the same community and there is no communal angle involved in the incident. The incident shown in the video is an old incident when the victim Ayesha recorded her husband Mushtaq assaulting her in front of their child. 

Hence, a video of domestic violence is being shared falsely as an incident of Love Jihad.