Controversial seer Yati Narsinghanand.
Credit: PTI Photo
Lucknow: Hindu seer Yati Narsinghanand’s reported ‘objectionable’ remarks on Prophet Muhammad and ‘Quaran’ sparked violent protests in several cities in Uttar Pradesh on Friday night prompting the police to use force to disperse the protesters.
According to the sources, Narsinghanand, who was the ‘Peethadheeshwar’ of the famous Dasna Temple in Ghaziabad, has been detained. The seer was kept in the Ghaziabad Police Lines, sources added.
Three cases have so far been lodged against Narsinghanand, sources said.
Eight people were detained in connection with the violence in UP’s Bulandshahar town on Friday night, sources said.
Reports said that hundreds of protesters took to the streets after the ‘Juma prayers’ (Namaz on Friday) in Ghaziabad, Bulandshahar in UP and also in some towns in other parts of the country demanding action against the Hindu seer.
The protesters also attacked a police station in Bulandshahar and indulged in heavy stone pelting, sources said. The protesters also pelted stones at the cops in Ghaziabad.
Large contingents of police and the PAC had been deployed at Ghaziabad, Bulandshahar, Aligarh and other sensitive towns in the state and security personnel also conducted flag marches in the troubled areas.
The situation became tense in Ghaziabad when hundreds of protesters assembled before the Dasna Temple on Friday night and raised slogans against the Seer. Narsinghanand was inside the Temple at that time.
Sources said that the seer was detained and kept in the Police Lines though the police officials refused to confirm the same.
Senior Muslim cleric and president of the Islamic Centre of India Maulana Khalid Rashid Firangimahali decried the seer’s remarks and demanded stern action against him.
Narsinghanand had reportedly made objectionable remarks on the Prophet and Quran during a sermon in the temple last month. He had earlier also courted controversy and was arrested in a case of alleged hate speech two years back.