Amnesty International has called for the immediate release of Indian academic Ali Khan Mahmudabad, who was arrested on charges of sedition over a social media post. Aakar Patel, head of Amnesty\u2019s India office, criticized the arrest, urging authorities to stop treating Mahmudabad as a criminal for expressing his views and advocating justice for victims of mob violence and alleged misuse of state power.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Mahmudabad, an associate professor and head of political science at Ashoka University, was detained on May 18 after posting a tweet referencing Colonel Sofia Qureshi, a military spokesperson praised by right-wing groups. In his tweet, he urged those same groups to also support victims of hate crimes and arbitrary demolitions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Haryana Women\u2019s Commission accused him of \u201cundermining national military efforts,\u201d and a complaint was filed by a youth leader from the ruling BJP party. Amnesty labeled the sedition charge as baseless and part of a pattern of suppressing dissent in India.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Amnesty International has called for the immediate release of Indian academic Ali Khan Mahmudabad, who was arrested on charges of sedition over a social media post. Aakar Patel, head of Amnesty\u2019s India office, criticized the arrest, urging authorities to stop treating Mahmudabad as a criminal for expressing his views and advocating justice for victims of …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":40,"featured_media":126563,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rop_custom_images_group":[],"rop_custom_messages_group":[],"rop_publish_now":"yes","rop_publish_now_accounts":{"facebook_108372464460192_245495985553329":""},"rop_publish_now_history":[],"rop_publish_now_status":"pending","footnotes":""},"categories":[2929,31],"tags":[89,14556],"class_list":["post-126562","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-india","category-news","tag-amnesty-international","tag-india-authorities"],"yoast_head":"\n