BJP, AAP Clash Over Tahir Hussain Life Sentence in 2020 Riots Case

A Delhi court on Friday sentenced former Aam Aadmi Party councillor Tahir Hussain and four others to life imprisonment for the murder of Intelligence Bureau officer Ankit Sharma during the 2020 north-east Delhi riots. The verdict immediately triggered a political war of words between the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party and the Opposition AAP in Delhi.

The court found Hussain and the four co-convicts guilty of killing Sharma, whose body was recovered from a drain during the communal violence that swept the area in February 2020. The riots, which left over 50 people dead and hundreds injured, were among the worst sectarian clashes in the national capital in recent decades.

Welcoming the verdict, Delhi Chief Minister Rekha Gupta said the judgement had established how AAP-backed miscreants spread riots in north-east Delhi. In a post on X, she questioned why AAP chief Arvind Kejriwal and leader Manish Sisodia had supported Hussain despite his arrest on murder charges. “Was it under their patronage that people like Tahir Hussain conspired to incite riots? Today, justice has triumphed,” she wrote.

Delhi BJP president Harsh Malhotra accused Kejriwal of sheltering criminals and said the party’s true character was now clear. Law Minister Kapil Mishra called the sentencing “the beginning of justice”.

Responding to the BJP’s barbs, AAP’s Delhi unit chief Saurabh Bharadwaj told a press conference that Hussain was expelled from the party as soon as an FIR was registered against him in the case. He alleged that Hussain had contested the Mustafabad Assembly election last year on an All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen ticket as part of a “well-planned strategy by the BJP” to damage AAP.

“In reality, Tahir Hussain was a BJP man. If anyone gained political advantage from the Delhi riots, it was the BJP,” Bharadwaj said. He also accused Kapil Mishra, who was earlier with AAP, of backing Hussain and propping him up as a politician. “Kapil Mishra’s own election office and MLA office were located in Tahir Hussain’s house, where weapons or stones allegedly used in the riots were found stored. It was Kapil Mishra who inducted Tahir Hussain into the party,” the senior AAP leader claimed.

The exchange highlights how the riots and the subsequent legal proceedings have become a political flashpoint in Delhi, with both parties seeking to gain an advantage. Hussain, a former AAP councillor from Mustafabad, was arrested in March 2020. The case against him included charges of murder, conspiracy, and rioting. The court’s verdict comes amid ongoing trials in several other riot-related cases.

While the BJP has sought to portray the verdict as a validation of its handling of the riots, AAP has consistently argued that the investigations have been politically motivated. The Congress, which is also a rival in Delhi’s competitive political landscape, has not yet issued a formal reaction.

Legal experts note that the life sentences are subject to appeal, and the full judgment is yet to be made public. The case has been tried under fast-track procedures, and the court has reportedly cited the brutality of the murder and the victim’s service to the nation as aggravating circumstances.

As the political sparring continues, the families of the victims and the convicts alike await the detailed judgement. For many residents of north-east Delhi, the verdict offers a measure of closure, though the deep communal wounds from the riots remain far from healed.