OpIndia was the first to call the mob violence in early 2020 during anti-CAA protests as “Anti-Hindu Delhi Riots”. For six years, OpIndia, through its ground reports, analysis and investigations into the chain of events and Islamist orchestrators, proved that what the mainstream media called ‘anti-CAA violence’, and leftist propagandists called ‘anti-Muslim riots’ and ‘state-sponsored conspiracy’, was in reality, a pre-planned Islamist pogrom against Hindus. With the conviction of former AAP councillor Tahir Hussain in the Ankit Sharma murder case, OpIndia stands vindicated.
From brutal murder of IB official Ankit Sharma to conviction of Tahir Hussain: Faith in justice reinstated after six years
On the 13th of July 2026, the Karkardooma court in New Delhi convicted former AAP councillor Tahir Hussain in the murder case of Intelligence Bureau (IB) official Ankit Sharma. Hussain, who earlier admitted that he wanted to “teach Hindus a lesson”, has been convicted for the offences under Section 188 (disobedience to public order), 153A (promoting enmity between groups), 147, 148, 149 (rioting and unlawful assembly), 365 (kidnapping/abduction), and 302 (murder) of IPC. Alongside Tahir Hussain, five other jihadis have also been convicted.
Additional Sessions Judge Praveen Singh acquitted Hussain for offences under Section 120B and 129 of IPC (criminal conspiracy) due to insufficient evidence.
On 25th February 2020, 26-year-old Intelligence Bureau staffer Ankit Sharma was brutally killed during the North-East Delhi anti-Hindu riots. Sharma went missing amid the communal violence that erupted in the area following protests against the Citizenship Amendment Act. His body was recovered the next day from a drain in the Chand Bagh area, bearing at least around 51 to 52 stab wounds.
A day after, deceased Ankit Sharma’s father Ravinder Kumar filed a complaint with the police, alleging that incidents of stone pelting, brick batting, arson, firing and sabotage had taken place during the anti-CAA protests at Chand Bagh Pulia, Main Karawal Nagar Road. He had alleged that then AAP leader Tahir Hussain’s office was located in that area and was housing several goons.
The Muslim mob had pelted stones, petrol bombs and gunshots were fired from the rooftop of the office of Tahir Hussain, and he had created an atmosphere of fear among the public. On 25 February, Ankit Sharma went out to buy some household items after coming back from office, and didn’t return.
Ravinder Kumar filed a missing person report the next day. Then he came to know that a man was thrown into the Khajuri Khas Nala from the Masjid of Chand Bagh Pulia after he was killed. After this, the body of Ankit Sharma was recovered from Khajuri Khas Nala. His clothes were missing, except the underwear.
Ankit Sharma had sustained sharp injuries on his head, face, chest, back and waist. His face and other parts of his body had been burned by acid to conceal his identity.
In its chargesheet, the Delhi Police had alleged a deeper conspiracy and stated that Ankit Sharma was specifically targeted by the mob that was led by Tahir Hussain.
Finally, the Delhi court has convicted Tahir Hussain and his jihadi accomplices for the horrific murder of Ankit Sharma. The sentencing of the convicts is due.
Islamo-leftists made Tahir Hussain a victim solely because of his Muslim identity: The monopoly of victimhood
The conviction of Tahir Hussain is not only about ensuring justice for Ankit Sharma but also confirms what OpIndia has been saying for years: that the 2020 Delhi riots were not spontaneous but the eventuality of a pre-planned conspiracy hatched by Islamo-leftists.
From Umar Khalid, Sharjeel Imam to now-convicted Tahir Hussain, the Indian and foreign Islamo-leftist media painted anti-Hindu Delhi Riots accused Muslims as victims, and continue making heroes out of them to date, despite contrasting evidence.
Days after Ankit Sharma’s murder, leftist propaganda site AltNews, co-founded by notorious Hinduphobes Pratik Sinha and Mohammed Zubair, gave a clean chit to Tahir Hussain. This came even as stones, petrol bombs, acid packs, improvised slingshots to hurl petrol bombs, etc were recovered from Tahir’s building after the riots, and videos had emerged showing hundreds of people throwing stones and petrol bombs from the roof of the building with Tahir supervising the attacks.
The now-banned Islamic terror group Popular Front of India (PFI) had extended support to Tahir Hussain, and even claimed that he had been a victim of “vicious politics”. The PFI, which wanted to make India an Islamic nation by 2047, had squarely blamed the Modi government for the Delhi riots.
Online rabid Islamists had defended Tahir Hussain and claimed that the petrol bombs and stones discovered on Tahir Hussain’s rooftop were for self-defence.
Bollywood lyricist Javed Akhtar, director Anurag Kashyap, entertainer Swara Bhasker, singer Vishal Dadlani, and several Islamo-leftist journalists like Rana Ayyub, Sakshi Joshi, among others, backed Tahir Hussain and portrayed him as a victim who was essentially being targeted by the ‘Hindu nationalist’ Modi government due to his Muslim religious identity.
The Wall Street Journal went as far as to falsely attribute a claim to Ankit Sharma’s brother that a Jai Shri Ram-shouting mob had killed him. Calling out their attempt to paint the Hindu-hate-driven murder of Ankit Sharma by a Tahir Hussain-led Muslim mob, Ankit’s brother had to issue a statement and say that the WSJ was lying.
Jamaat-e-Islami declared Hussain “innocent”, claimed that he was being framed and described his actions as self-defence. They presented Hussain’s surrender as ‘proof’ that he could not be guilty.
Similarly, AAP MLA Amanatullah Khan claimed Hussain was imprisoned only because he was Muslim. Khan suggested that the government would somehow fabricate proof that Hussain had orchestrated the Delhi violence.
In November 2020, The Wire included Hussain among “activists, scholars and scribes” supposedly left at the judiciary’s mercy. The Islamo-leftist rag portrayed the riot and murder accused Tahir Hussain as a victim of a political blame game. OpIndia had highlighted back then how The Wire used the fabricated story of the Wall Street Journal, where they quoted Ankit Sharma’s brother being killed by ‘Hindu rioters’.
Ground reports, evidence analysis, chargesheet dissection and more: How OpIndia Delhi Anti-Hindu Riots coverage told stories that nobody else did or attempted to suppress
It must be recalled that on 24th and 25th February 2020, the anti-Hindu Delhi riots took place in Northeast Delhi. The violence erupted amid anti-CAA protests. It soon spread across several areas. 53 people lost their lives, and hundreds were injured.
The dead included Head Constable Ratan Lal, Intelligence Bureau official Ankit Sharma, Dilbar Negi, Rahul Solanki, Vinod Kumar and many others. Over 1,500 public and private properties were damaged during the violence. Homes, shops, vehicles, religious places and public infrastructure were attacked.
The riots left large parts of Northeast Delhi under fear for days before normalcy returned. The Crime Branch of Delhi Police registered FIR No 52/2020 to probe the larger conspiracy behind the violence. According to the prosecution, the riots were not spontaneous, but part of a deep-rooted conspiracy carried out under the cover of protests against CAA and NRC.
Umar Khalid, Sharjeel Imam, Tahir Hussain, Khalid Saifi, Ishrat Jahan, Gulfisha Fatima, Natasha Narwal, Devangana Kalita, Athar Khan, Safoora Zargar, and others were named in the FIR.
While Islamo-leftists were churning out their victimhood propaganda whitewashing the anti-Hindu crimes of Tahir Hussain through their usual tactic of invoking ‘Islamophobia’, disputing video evidence, communalise police action and downplay what witnesses and investigators found, OpIndia manoeuvred to bring out the jihadist truth behind Ankit Sharma’s killing and the larger Islamist conspiracy, which in Tahir Hussain’s words, was to “teach Hindus a lesson”.
OpIndia interviewed Ankit Sharma’s brother
On 27th February 2020, OpIndia published an exclusive interview with Ankit Sharma’s brother Ankur Sharma. In this conversation with OpIndia’s Editor-in-Chief Nupur J Sharma, Ankur detailed how Ankit left his home to pacify violence in Chand Bagh, Moonga Nagar area. Ankit told his family that both Hindus and Muslims knew him and would listen. Ankit emphasised his IB official identity, believing that then people would be able to trust him better.
“Usne kaha main in logo ko jaanta hu, ye meri baat sun lenge” (He said I know these people personally, they will listen to me), said Ankur told OpIndia.
While Hindus heeded him and retreated, the Muslim mob grew enraged upon learning that Sharma was an IB officer; they soon caught hold of him and dragged him towards Tahir Hussain’s 4-storey house. All this while, stones, petrol bombs, and gunshots rained.
“It was Tahir Hussain who killed him [Ankit Sharma], didi. He is the head of the riots here. He is conducting the riots. He was directing the Musalmans who dragged him inside the house. Arvind Kejriwal will paint my brother as a rioter, didi. He was not a rioter. He was a government official who had gone there to convince people to stop fighting. He knew people from both sides,” Ankur said and also requested that a campaign should be done to secure martyr status for Ankit Sharma.
At a time when foreign and Indian leftist media was working overtime to paint Hindus as the primary orchestrators of Delhi riots and portray Tahir Hussain as holier-than-thou, an OpIndia interview with Ankit Sharma’s brother exposed the then AAP councillor’s true jihadist face.
OpIndia spoke to the boy who saw the Muslim mob dragging Ankit Sharma inside Tahir Hussain’s building
On 28th February 2020, an OpIndia reporter spoke with a minor Hindu boy who managed to make a miraculous escape and dodged an excruciating death at the hands of a ferocious Muslim mob.
The minor boy, who was successful in rescuing himself, laid bare his experience in chilling details about the carnage unleashed by the Muslim mob sheltered inside now expelled AAP leader Tahir Hussain’s building. “They were dragging us inside the building. I somehow evaded their grip and extricated myself. But when I looked back, all three were missing,” the boy said in a trembling voice while referring to the three people, including Ankit Sharma, who were dragged inside the building owned by Tahir Hussain, by the murderous mob.
The boy also revealed that the Muslim mob had attacked a Shiv Mandir in Chand Bagh.
Investigating Islamo-leftist narrative intervention on the Wikipedia page of Delhi Riots
In early March 2020, OpIndia published an investigative report highlighting how a Wikipedia article titled or 2020 Delhi Riots or North East Delhi riots was created on 25th February by a senior Wikipedia editor who goes by the username DBigXray. This page peddled a one-sided Muslim victimhood bogey. While the page has now undergone many changes over the years, it initially featured the photo of BJP leader Kapil Mishra, not an image of the riots. Kapil Mishra gets a separate section titled ‘incitement’ in the article, where he has been blamed for starting the riots. The page either downplayed the role of Islamist rioters or withheld key information.
The article mentioned the attack on a mosque in Ashok Nagar and shouting of “Jai Shri Ram” and “Hinduon ka Hindustan” slogans by the mobs, but gave no reference to any attack by Muslims and anti-CAA mobs. On the other hand, while there are videos showing mobs shouting “Nara e Taqbeer” and “Allahu Akbar”, they find no place on the page.
OpIndia investigation confirmed that the editor behind the biased edits on the Delhi Riots page, DBigXray, was one Deepesh Raj. The article mentioned the attack on a mosque in Ashok Nagar and shouting of “Jai Shri Ram” and “Hinduon ka Hindustan” slogans by the mobs, but has absolutely no reference to any attack by Muslims and anti-CAA mobs. On the other hand, while there are videos showing mobs shouting “Nara e Taqbeer” and “Allahu Akbar”, they find no place on the page.
Meeting devastated family of 20-year-old Dilbar Singh Negi
On the evening of 24 February, when violence erupted in Delhi, 20-year-old Dilbar Singh Negi was burnt by Islamist rioters after they brutally chopped off his limbs with a sword. The rest of his body was tossed into the fire like a piece of meat by the blood-thirsty mob. OpIndia had met his family in July 2020, right after the Delhi anti-Hindu riots where he was murdered by a Muslim mob.
Dilbar’s younger brother, Devendra, stated that he has made compromises over time, but his parents are still unwilling to accept that Dilbar would never return home. When the sons return home before every festival, their eyes begin to glitter with the expectation that Dilbar will also return. They were hoping to see their son again during the Thaulu-Tyaar festival, but their hopes were dashed when his mortal remains came home.
Hindu shops deliberately targeted by Muslim mobs
OpIndia visited Delhi’s Chand Bagh area on the 27th of February 2020, in the aftermath of the riots, which, like many other areas in the National Capital, was burning as Islamists ran amok, resorting to stone-pelting, arson, and vandalism, destroying public properties worth crores and hurting police personnel and civilians in the ensuing mayhem. The Muslim rioters read the signboards of the shops with the name of the shops before deciding which shop to burn and which to spare. While Hindu shops were ruined, ransacked, and burned, the Muslim shops were left untouched, recounted the locals. This essentially meant that these Muslim rioters had, in advance, gathered detailed information about the Hindus residing in Chand Bagh.
Tahir Hussain’s building housed around 3,000 jihadi rioters, petrol bombs and other weapons to target Hindus
A crowd of Muslims, mostly youths, approached from Mustafabad in Delhi. They all gathered on the bridge of Chand Bagh. From there, they reached Aam Aadmi Party councillor Tahir Hussain’s building. They went to the terrace, from where they started throwing stones and petrol bombs. In our ground reportage on February 26-27th 2020, we were told that there were more than 3000 Muslim rioters in Tahir Hussain’s building.
It becomes imperative to note here that Tahir Hussain is the AAP leader from whose terrace, not just petrol bombs, but sacks full of brick pieces, stones, acid packs and even catapults to hurl the stones and petrol bombs were discovered.
Moreover, it has emerged that slain IB officer Ankit Sharma was dragged into Tahir Hussain’s house before his murder, and his body was found in a ditch behind Hussain’s house. Back then, locals had revealed to OpIndia how IB officer Ankit Sharma was dragged into Tahir Hussain’s building by Islamists.
When Islamo-leftist media and politicians were busy painting Hindus as the villains of the Delhi Riots, OpIndia highlighted how an Islamist mob forcibly occupied a Shiv Mandir
While the Islamo-leftist cabal relied on half-truths and their fertile imagination to portray Hindus as the orchestrators and villains of the 2020 Delhi Riots, and Muslims as victims, OpIndia brought forth the horrific accounts of how Hindu houses, shops and places of worship are being attacked, torched, and vandalised by the frenzied Islamist fundamentalists who had converted the anti-CAA protest to anti-Hindu riots in the national capital.
Apart from claiming the lives of several Hindus, Islamist rioters also vandalised and burned Hindu-owned shops and many temples. One such Shiv Mandir in Delhi’s Chand Bagh area, which OpIndia visited, was also a witness to these riots.
Muslims were prepared for riots; women and children were armed to attack Hindus: Eyewitness tells Op.India
Mostly all the eyewitnesses OpIndia got in touch with hours after the Delhi anti-Hindu riots in 2020 revealed that the Islamists had been preparing for these anti-Hindu riots for a long time under the pretext of anti-CAA protest.
On condition of anonymity, the Hindu woman, living in a rented house in Sonia Vihar, told OpIndia, “All the Islamist rioters had hoarded bricks and stones inside their respective houses in advance. They were constantly bringing out the bricks and stones from there. Seeing all this, I was so scared that I could not even sleep the whole night. The area we live in predominantly belongs to the Muslims and our locality is the only locality which houses Hindus.”
Shiv Vihar ground report: OpIndia highlighted how Muslim-owned Rajdhani School became fortress of jihadi rioters
While riots raged on in Delhi, OpIndia published several ground reports that showed Islamist aggression against Hindus. One such report was from Shiv Vihar, located in Karavar Nagar in North East Delhi, which saw widespread riots by Muslims against Hindus.
There are two schools in Shiv Vihar. One is Rajdhani Public School and the other is called DRP Public School. While the Rajdhani school belongs to a Muslim, DRP is owned by one Mr Sharma. During the anti-Hindu Delhi riots, one of these schools was gutted, and the other was made a den to perpetrate violence. It does not really take a lot to guess which school met what fate.
Rajdhani School, which is owned by a Muslim, was turned into a fortress from where the Islamists launched attacks in the area. Rioters were given protection and shelter in that school. It is from this school that stones were pelted, guns were fired, and petrol bombs were hurled. On the rooftop of this school, our reporter found several slingshots that were used to hurl heavy stones and petrol bombs.
When OpIndia reporters reached the rooftop of the Rajdhani school, it was evident that the preparation for riots that were stockpiled could not have been collected in a day or two.
The media focused on the breakage at Rajdhani school extensively, probably because the school is owned by a Muslim, but they did not reveal that the breakage was actually just a drama by the Islamists. The fact is that Rajdhani school had mild vandalism while DRT school was completely gutted.
Muslim rioters attacked Hindus on one hand out of hatred for Hindus, and self-vandalised their own shops to claim victimhood.imhood
A week after the violence in Delhi, we met the riot victims in Brijpuri. During this, we got a piece of startling information. This information came from the person who runs the shop near the Hero showroom and also stays at the shop for 12 hours a day and keeps an eye on every activity nearby. According to eyewitnesses, “Muslim women started protesting on Sunday in the name of the CAA protest. After this, everyone started preparing. On Monday, violence erupted from Chand Bagh. Muslims were first looting Hindu shops and then setting them on fire.”
Eyewitnesses living in Brijpuri further state, “Not only this, these people (Muslims) all knew what was going to happen next. The only Muslim bike showroom in the area, which used to have hundreds of bikes for sale, had taken all the bikes out of the showroom to a safe place at 5 am on February 26, just before violence broke out in the area. After this, the rioters themselves first vandalised the showroom to show themselves as victims and then took the counter out of the showroom and set it on fire.”
OpIndia spoke to the brother of a Dalit Hindu murdered in Delhi anti-Hindu riots
Dinesh Kumar Khatik was one of the individuals killed in anti-Hindu riots in Delhi. OpIndia had a conversation with Dinesh Kumar Khatik’s brother Suresh, and he clearly said that his brother’s life was taken by jihad – the jihad of Islamic fundamentalists. He said that the whole of Mustafabad killed his brother. By Mustafabad, he meant a Muslim-dominated area. This is how the gruesome murder unfolded.
Women from Chand Bagh told OpIndia that ‘rioters took off our girls’ clothes, sent them back naked’
Back in 2020, OpIndia interacted with many Hindu victims, few of whom had narrated to us how the Islamists who had unleashed mayhem in various parts of Delhi misbehaved with Hindu women and girls. A woman told OpIndia on condition of anonymity, “We have come out of our houses for the first time in three days. Whatever these people (Muslims of the area) did with us is being reported, but they didn’t even leave our daughters returning from tuition. They took off their clothes and sent them to us naked. In front of our daughters, the rioters took off their own clothes and gestured indecently. We can never dream of ever wanting to kill our neighbours, but it is evident from their preparation that they wanted to finish us all off that day”.
OpIndia ground report detailed how Hindus were being forced to abandon their homes after the Delhi riots
OpIndia in its extensive reportage on the Delhi riots has laid bare the horrors of the atrocity meted out on Hindus from December 2019, which finally culminated in the gruesome riots in Delhi in February 2020.
In August 2020, OpIndia ground report 2020 revealed how almost 150-200 Hindu families concentrated in three lanes of Delhi’s three Muslim dominated areas- Subhash Mohalla, Madhuban Mohalla and Mohanpuri area in Maujpur had put up posters of ‘The house is on sale due to fear of members of a particular community’ outside their houses as they are being terrorised by the Muslim residents of the locality.
The Hindu victims took our correspondent through the lane and bylane of Mohanpuri area in Maujpur, which were amongst the worst affected by the Muslim transgression. Almost all the Hindu shops and houses which were attacked, looted or burnt down months ago had posters on their walls that read “the house was on sale”.
OpIndia exposed broader Islamist conspiracy links behind 2020 Delhi Riots
OpIndia was unarguably the first to report extensively on connections involving Umar Khalid, Khalid Saifi, Tahir Hussain, Sharjeel Imam, Yogendra Yadav, and the early meetings hosted by disgraced lawyer Prashant Bhushan about chakka jam and other conspiratorial details.
OpIndia consistently countered attempts, be it by Indian and foreign media using brown sepoys, to portray the jihadist rioters and conspirators of the anti-Hindu riots as ‘champions of dissent’, ‘crusaders for democracy’, ‘defenders of secularism’, etc. From The Guardian, The New York Times, The Washington Post, to The Wire, Scroll, and other Indian leftist rags, they intermittently publish articles humanising the accused rioters, especially Umar Khalid and Sharjeel Imam. OpIndia has been at the forefront of countering this Hindu-hating global Islamo-leftist propaganda factory.
Tahir Hussain was the key instigator of the anti-Hindu Delhi Riots, confessed to his Islamist fanaticism-driven role, and yet got rewarded by his co-religionists
As per the Delhi Police chargesheet, Tahir Hussain had planned the riots with Umar Khalid and Khalid Saifi back on 8th January during a meeting at Shaheen Bagh. Several transactions from shell companies were suspicious. The chargesheet detailed several such transactions from Tahir Hussain’s account that indicate that he had started receiving money to organise the riots. Some of the money was even routed through shell companies. The police also alleged that Umar Khalid had assured Tahir Hussain that, financially, Islamist outfit PFI (Popular Front of India) was ready to help in organising the riots.
Hussain had his licenced pistol with 100 rounds deposited with the police released, just a few days before the Delhi Riots broke out. He failed to give a satisfactory answer about the remaining 14 live cartridges and 22 empty/fired cartridges after arrest.
Tahir Hussain made several PCR calls as a decoy to ensure that his involvement in the riots was not revealed. He ensured that the CCTV cameras were turned off so the evidence was not recorded.
In Chargesheet Number 114/20, for example, his role in burning the shops of Hindus and instigating the Muslim mob to attack Hindus is clearly made out.
In one of the disclosure statements signed by Tahir Hussain on the 5th of May 2020, he reveals how he planned the riots to ‘teach kafirs a lesson’.
Tahir Hussain confessed that during the nationwide protests against the Citizenship Amendment Act, he received information that there were some rallies planned in support of CAA. After receiving this information, he met with others and hatched a conspiracy to “teach them a lesson”. Further, Tahir Hussain confessed in the Disclosure Statement that, per this conspiracy that he had hatched, he chose his own house as a launchpad for the riots since it was a high-rise in the area.
Hussain also admitted that he, along with his brothers Shah Alam, Arshad, Abid, Shahid, Irshad and several others, were present at his residence during the riots. He also admitted that on the afternoon of 24th February 2020, his mobs started chanting ‘Allah Hu Akbar’ and ‘Maaro Maaro Kaafiro Ko Maaro’ and he supervised them for targeting Hindu houses specifically.
Despite the naked truth of Tahir Hussain’s Hindu hate and unambiguous role in inciting violence against Hindus, and killing of IB officer Ankit Sharma, Tahir Hussain received support from his coreligionists, and the ideologically subservient media.
Earning his top reward for spearheading a conspiracy to kill Hindus, Tahir Hussain was given a ticket from the Mustafabad Assembly constituency last year by the AIMIM – the Muslim party of Asaduddin Owaisi. Hussain was seen gloating about Muslims turning up in huge numbers just to have a glimpse of him, with some even saying that Allah has given ‘great success’ to Tahir Hussain.
Rest assured, for his coreligionists, Tahir Hussain remains an innocent ‘framed’ by the Hindutva government due to his Muslim identity despite his conviction in the Ankit Sharma murder case. This is because Muslims have a monopoly over victimhood. OpIndia, however, played its humble role in ensuring that Muslim victimhood propaganda does not erase truth and hopes that Hindus shall not be deprived of justice in their own motherland.
