Muslim men rejoice over Hindu deaths in the Pahalgam Hindu massacre by Islamic terrorists
Madhya Pradesh, India 
21 April, 2025
Case Summary
Following the Pahalgam Hindu massacre, three Muslim individuals from Madhya Pradesh made inflammatory and disrespectful comments towards the Hindu victims on social media. The accused were identified as Mohammad Osaf Khan, Tanveer Qureshi and Waseem Khan. According to media reports, in Jabalpur, a 37-year-old Muslim man named Mohammad Osaf Khan, a resident of New Anand Nagar, posted an inflammatory comment on Facebook towards a Hindu woman who was the survivor of the Pahalgam attack, but her husband was killed by terrorists. Osaf wrote a comment on Facebook saying, “This woman must be investigated. She might have hired a shooter and got rid of her husband when she got the chance.” Following this, the post went viral and drew sharp criticism from people. A local Hindu man, Abhay Srivastava, lodged a formal complaint at the Hanumantal Police Station, demanding action against the accused for spreading misinformation and insulting the Hindu victims of Islamic terrorism in Pahalgam. The police reacted quickly and apprehended the accused and registered a case under Section 196(1) of the Bharatiya Nyay Sanhita (BNS). The accused would soon be produced before the court. SP Crime Branch Sonali Dubey stated, “Any insensitive or provocative remarks during such sensitive times will not be tolerated. We are closely monitoring social media, and anyone posting harmful or disrespectful content will face legal consequences. In another instance, Wasim Khan from Bhopal and Tanveer Qureshi from Damoh also made communal content. They made a provocative parallel comparison between the massacre of Hindu tourists at the hands of Islamic terrorists to extremely rare occurrences of Muslims being lynched over religious slogans. According to a report by the Hindu Post, another Muslim man named Sheikh Mukhtar endorsed the views of Wasim and Tanveer. This post drew attention and outrage on social media, following which both the accused, Wasim and Tanveer, were arrested by the Damoh police. SP Shrutkirti Somvanshi confirmed the arrests and said: “The two were arrested after our cyber cell flagged their posts. A FIR has been lodged against them under Sections 353(2), 196, 299, and 3(5) of the BNS for promoting enmity between communities, spreading false information, and hurting religious sentiments.” According to police reports, the arrested individuals used social media platforms to make inflammatory comments and celebrate the violence, causing public outrage and deepening communal tensions. They attempted to incite communal sentiments and disturb communal harmony. In a horrific act of terror in the Baisaran Valley of Pahalgam, Anantnag district, Jammu and Kashmir, Islamic terrorists systematically identified and targeted Hindu victims. The assailants demanded names and religious identities, inspected ID cards, coerced tourists to recite the Kalma, and even forcibly pulled down their pants to check for circumcision, all to single out non-Muslims. Once identified, the Hindus were shot at point-blank range. The attack, carried out by operatives of The Resistance Force, a proxy of the Pakistan-based terror group Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), claimed the lives of 24 Hindus and left 16 others critically injured.
Why it is Hate Crime ?
This case has been added to the tracker under the primary category of - Hate speech against Hindus. The subcategory selected is - Denial or mocking of genocide/large-scale persecution. Denial or mocking of genocide/large-scale persecution/ethnic cleansing refers to the act of denying or minimizing the fact of the ethnic cleansing and/or genocide and/or religious persecution of Hindus. This often involves denying the scale, mechanisms, religious intent, or even the occurrence of the ethnic cleansing and/or genocide and/or religious persecution of Hindus. Hate speech of this kind involves the dissemination of falsehoods that deny or distort established historical facts or mock the suffering of Hindus by saying that they deserved the persecution, motivated by Hinduphobia. Denying such atrocities is not only about the denial of facts or rewriting/revising history, but it also delegitimises the religiously motivated persecution of Hindus, the religious hate/motivation/animosity that led to the persecution, and dehumanises Hindus as a religious group. Such denial of ethnic cleansing and/or genocide and/or religious persecution of Hindus not only denies the suffering but also paves the way for future/present atrocities and hate speech, inciting prejudice and violence against Hindus. It also provides a justification for violence by delinking religious animosity from religiously motivated crimes committed against Hindus. Since such denial and/or mocking of genocide/ethnic cleansing/atrocities motivated by religious animosity leads to present and future ramifications of creating more hate speech, violence, dehumanisation and delegitimisation, it would be considered hate speech under this category. During the horrific massacre of Hindus in Pahalgam, the Islamic terrorists explicitly identified the victims by their religion, asking them to recite the Islamic Kalma and checking for circumcision to single out Hindus before shooting them. It is confirmed by survivor testimonies and forensic evidence that the Hindu men’s trousers were unzipped or pulled down to verify their religion before being killed at point-blank range. Despite this, Osaf Khan made mockery and inflammatory statements towards the victims of the Pahalgam Hindu massacre, especially towards the woman who was a survivor herself, but had lost her husband in the attack. The accused was actively involved in the denial and minimisation of the religious profiling and targeted killing of Hindus in the Pahalgam terror attack. In another Instance, the other two accused, Wasim and Tanveer, drew parallels with the Pahalgam terror attack, with extremely rare instances of Muslims being lynched amidst chanting of religious slogans. These sorts of parallels drawn when Hindus are selectively targeted and killed in terror attacks are done to downplay and delegitimise the sufferings of the Hindu victims. These statements and comments are not 'mischievous online behaviour', but rather, they glaringly highlight the animosity and hatred against Hindus and Hinduism at large. It reflects a deep-rooted problem of a lack of empathy towards the Hindu victims of Islamic terror. These instances occur due to religious animosity that is sanctioned by the Islamic theology and Islamic preachers themselves. There is overwhelming evidence and victim testimonies that highlight that the massacre of Hindus in Pahalgam was not a random occurrence of violence, but rather a malicious, religiously motivated crime rooted in animosity with the victims' Hindu identity. The denial of religious profiling and killing of Hindus delegitimises the suffering of Hindu victims and erases the religious motivation behind the attack. It dehumanises Hindus as a group and fosters an environment conducive to future violence against Hindus. This behaviour clearly constitutes hate speech, as it legitimises, downplays and mocks the hostility and prejudice towards Hindus, further endangering their safety and rights.
Case Status
Arrested
Perpetrators Details
Perpetrators
Muslim Extremists
Perpetrators Range
From 2 To 5
Perpetrators Gender
male
Sources 
