Absurd as it may sound, the Maharashtra police believes members of the banned terror group SIMI are now taking inspiration from Mirza Ghalib.

Bordering on the insane and the improbable, the affidavits are a testimony to the fact that the police have been plain lazy while preparing a “watertight case” against SIMI. Of the several affidavits — filed in court asking for the ban on the group to continue — accessed by DNA, one by inspector Shivajirao Tambare of Vijapur Naka, Solapur, cites a Ghalib verse — as part of evidence — to show how dangerous SIMI (Students Islamic Movement of India) is.

Mauje khoon ser se guzer hi kiyon na jay, Aastane yaar se uth jaein kaya! A loosely translated Marathi version in the affidavit concludes that these lines speak of bloodshed and animosity.

Khalid Mehmood, the head of Jamia Millia Islamia’s Urdu department, however, has a different take. He told DNA that the lines, in fact, have a positive meaning: “Whatever be the circumstances, we will not leave the place (country or home of the beloved) even if our heads are chopped off…”.

Matters do not end here. Affidavit after affidavit, accessed by DNA, cites “secession of Maharashtra from India and thereby, disrupting the sovereignty and the territorial integrity of the country”, as a reason to ban SIMI. The police — instead of providing any evidence to back their claim — have concluded that Ghalib’s shayari is the culprit.

Not only the Maharashtra police but also the Andhra Pradesh cops have come up with strange reasons — once again no definite evidence — for the ban to continue.

P Devender, an inspector of Saidabad police station in Hyderabad, has said in an affidavit that members of the banned outfit continue their covert activities in the city and other parts of Andhra Pradesh under the cover of eight frontal organisations, including Pakistan’s Inter Services Intelligence (ISI).

At the previous tribunal’s hearing, when Devender was asked if he really meant that the ISI was a front for the SIMI and it was operating in AP, the inspector told the judge: “Yes, I am referring to Pakistan’s ISI.”

In another affidavit, inspector Uday Singh Rathod of the Ghatkopar police station in Mumbai, cites material seized from two SIMI activists — Shabir Ahmed Mashiullah from Malegaon and Nafis Ahmed Ansari from Mumbai. The material filed as evidence is neither arms nor ammunition or incriminating material. It is a children’s magazine in Urdu, called Umang, published by the Delhi Urdu Akademi.

All the affidavits will be placed before the judicial tribunal — headed by justice VK Shali of the Delhi high court — while seeking an extension of the ban on SIMI, under the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act, when the hearing starts on Wednesday.