On Friday, the Punjab police arrested a man named Tausif Chishti for helping an ultra associated with a Babbar Khalsa terrorist.   

Tausif is son of a joint secretary of Anjuman Committee of the dargah. He is suspected of providing hideout and weapon to Charat Singh, an alleged side of Babar Khalsa terrorist Lakhbir Singh alias Landa.

The arrest is in relation to a May 9 grenade attack on Mohali police headquarters. 

A special squad of the Punjab police raided a café in Ajmer and arrested Tausif, and took him to Punjab. 

The police had caught Charat Singh a few days earlier from Mumbai. He had revealed Chishti’s name during interrogation, saying he helped him hide after he escaped from Mohali. Other arrests made in the case so far are Mohammed Naseem Alam and Mohammed Sarfaraz.

Tausif is son of Tariq Chishti, cousin of Fakhar Jamali who was arrested in July by Rajasthan police for giving beheading calls for former Bharatiya Janata Party spokesperson Nupur Sharma over alleged ‘blasphemy’ of Islam’s founder.  

Sharma had made some comments in a television news debate on Mohammed which enraged the Muslim community. Street rallies were taken out across India demanding death punishment for her. The rallies were accompanied by calls for vigilante justice for Sharma as per Shariah – beheading.

Sharma was later suspended as spokesperson by the party. 

Besides Jamali, the police had also arrested Syed Salman Chishti, another official at the dargah. In a video, Salman offered to give away his house and property to anyone who beheaded Sharma.

Salman’s video was released a few days before an Udaipur resident named Kanhaiya Lal was beheaded by two Muslim men named Ghoud Mohammed and Riyaz Attari for supporting Sharma through a social media post.