BAREILLY: The chairperson of Nawabganj Nagar Palika in Bareilly district of Uttar Pradesh (UP) India, Shehla Tahir, has been booked for sedition after “pro-Pakistan slogans” were raised at her victory procession in December last year, reported the Times of India.
However, Shehla denies the charges, saying nobody could be “stupid enough to chant such slogans in today’s Uttar Pradesh (UP)”.
In a video which forms the basis of the FIR against Shehla, a lone voice is heard saying ‘Pakistan Zindabad’ off camera at Tahir’s victory march on December 19 after she won the civic poll. Her husband Mohammad Tahir and 500 others have also been booked for sedition in the case filed on Tuesday.
She told the TOI, “I, or my supporters, have no reason to talk about Pakistan when we live in India and are Indian citizens. I have been in public life for two decades and served the people of Nawabganj as Nagar Palika chairperson once before. On every national festival — Republic Day, Independence Day, and even Gandhi Jayanti — I hoist the tricolour, sing the national anthem and our national song.”
Shehla said that those in the opposition “must think twice” before levelling sedition charges against her. “I want to make it clear to one and all that I am an Indian by choice, not by chance and will serve my country until my last breath,” she said.