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Taliban justice in Kerala: Lecturers hand cut off
In a sign of growing Islamic fundamentalism in Kerala, Muslim fanatics in Kerala on Sunday chopped off the right hand of a college lecturer, accusing him of setting a question paper with a derogatory reference to the Prophet.In this horrific instance of Talibanism, Lecturer T J Joseph who was returning home from church with his mother and sister in Muvattupuzha in Ernakulam district, was accosted by the attackers. The family had just got into their car when a van pulled up in front. Around eight people armed with swords and knives emerged and pulled out Joseph after smashing the windscreen. They then chopped off his right hand and stabbed him in the left thigh," said Joseph's sister, Mary Stella, a nun. "When we tried to prevent them, they attacked me and and our mother before exploding bombs and fleeing." A police team recovered the severed hand from the compound of a house about 200m away. The 52-year-old lecturer was rushed to a private hospital where his condition was serious. Police recovered the van in which the fanatics reached the scene. Two men, said to be activists of the Popular Front, a new incarnation of the hardline National Democratic Front, have also been taken into custody. Special police squads are searching sensitive areas in and around the town. "Personnel from this district and neighbouring places are working as a team and we'll nab the assailants soon," said IG B Sandhya. In March this year, Islamic outfits had carried out protests against Joseph, who was a lecturer in the church-run Newman college in Thodupuzha in Idukki district over a portion in the Malayalam question paper for an internal examination for BCom students. They claimed that the question paper insulted the Prophet. The college later suspended Joseph who had set the questions and a criminal case was registered against him. The case is pending trial. Posted by: tipper 2010-07-06 |
| http://www.rantburg.com/poparticle.php?ID=300426 |