While Indian-American Narendra Kumar Patel was sentenced to 24 months in prison, the two other co-conspirators Mary Bennett and Eugenia Burks have been sentenced to 75 and 18 months respectively.

AHMEDABAD: Gujarat accounts for over a third of the total Muslim detainees in the country, Union home ministry figures show.

Of the country’s 658 Muslim detainees, 240 are in PM Narendra Modi’s home state. Tamil Nadu is a close second with 220.

India has 82,190 Muslims in its jails and police custody. These include 21,550 convicts, 59,550 undertrials in prisons and 658 in lock-ups.

The state has 58.6 lakh Muslims who account for 9.7% of 6 crore Gujaratis. The number of Muslim detainees is disproportionate to the state’s share in the country’s Muslim population. Gujarat is home to 3.4% of India’s 17.2-crore Muslim population. Yet the state accounts for 36.5% of total Muslims detainees. Like Gujarat, the number of Muslim detainees in Tamil Nadu is also disproportionate to that state’s share in India’s Muslim population, which stands at just 2.5%.

Gujarat has 846 convicts — 3.9% of Muslims convicted. For undertrials, this figure stands at 1,724 or 2.9% of Muslim undertrials.

Uttar Pradesh, which has the highest number of Muslims behind bars — including 5,040 convicts and 17,858 undertrials — has just 45 detainees. The state accounts for 22.4% of India’s Muslim population.

Interestingly, Jammu and Kashmir, which is battling insurgency, accounts for just 35 Muslim detainees. The state accounts for about 5% of India’s Muslims. It has 153 Muslim convicts and 1,125 undertrials.

Activists allege that laws like Prevention of Anti-Social Activities Act 1985 (Pasa) and the now-repealed Prevention of Terrorism Activities Act (Pota) is used mostly against minorities.

Shamshad Pathan, a city-based civil rights activist and lawyer, alleges that the main reason for detaining Muslims is to instil fear in the minority community. “After 2000, there was a trend to detain Muslims for interrogation and that, too, on suspicion of terrorism. Police would force these detainees to become informers and threaten them that they would otherwise be framed in cases of terrorism,” Pathan alleged.

Gujarat minister of state for home Rajnikant Patel denied that people were being victimized on basis of their community. “Offences are registered as per law. No community is targeted while registering any case — be it for Pasa or any other offence,” Patel said.

