VIDEO: 'Police Made Us Take Off Our Pants To Check Religion, Demanded ₹1.5 Lakh,' Muslim Men Complain Of Religious Discrimination In MP's Vidisha

Bhopal (Madhya Pradesh): As many as 14 Muslim men have lodged a police complaint, accusing some cops of Murwas police station of detaining them forcefully in Madhya Pradesh’s Vidisha district. They accused the policemen of making them take off pants to check their caste/religion and hurling abuses on them. 

The matter came to fore through a video circulating on social media in which one of the victims can be seen narrating all the ordeals they faced.  

He said, “I study in Bhopal. I returned home on August 1. As we were sitting together at a shop, jeeps of police arrived. They unlawfully detained us, made a video of us, and took us to the police station.”

“Here, they abused us, assaulted us physically and forced us to take off our pants so that they could check our castes,“ he added.

He further alleged that police had registered 112 FIRs against all of them and asked them for ₹1.5 lakh, and if they could not provide the amount, all the victims would be assaulted the entire night, taken out for a procession next morning and would have to face legal consequences. 

They claim police demanded bribes between ₹6k and ₹10k for release and also forced them to call their parents for money.

The complainants further said that when Sarpanch Umar Khan went to the police station to inquire about them, he too was threatened with an FIR and targeted with slurs. 

According to them, police later booked them under charges of 'organised gambling' and sent them to jail without explanation.

It has been a week since the complaints were filed, but no inquiry or action has been taken yet. Locals point out this is not an isolated case, as recent incidents of police brutality have also been reported in Guna, Dewas, and Bhopal.