The Delhi Police on Wednesday alleged a conspiracy to frame Bharatiya Janata Party minister Kapil Mishra for riots that took place in the national capital in February 2020, Live Law reported.

The police, in a written submission to Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate Vaibhav Chaurasia of the Rouse Avenue Courts, opposed a petition by an individual named Mohammad Ilyas seeking the filing of a first information report against Mishra for his alleged involvement in the communal violence that left 53 dead and hundreds injured.

The clashes had broken out in North East Delhi in February 2020 between supporters of the Citizenship Amendment Act and those opposing it.

Mishra, who is now the minister of law and justice in the BJP-led Delhi government, was being framed in the matter and had no role to play in the violence, according to the police. Mishra’s alleged role in the riots had been investigated and nothing incriminating had been found, they added.

The police also referred to several WhatsApp groups, including the Delhi Protest Support Group, claiming that those framing Mishra were trying to fuel a narrative against him on social media, Live Law reported.

The court reserved its order for March 24, when it will decide whether the case warrants the registration of a case against Mishra and others. Ilyas has sought the registration of a case against Mishra, the then station house officer at Dayalpur police station and five others.

The Delhi Police has claimed that the violence was part of a larger conspiracy to defame the Narendra Modi government and was plotted by those who organised the protests against the contentious citizenship law.

Ilyas, on the other hand, claimed that he witnessed Mishra and his associates blocking a road and destroying street vendors’ carts on February 23, 2020. He added that police officers stood next to Mishra and ordered protestors to vacate the area or face consequences.

Ilyas is among a handful of citizens who approached the courts after the police refused to register their complaints and file an FIR against Mishra.

While the Delhi Police has maintained that activists, students and local politicians who participated in the protests went on to orchestrate the riots, a fact-finding committee constituted by the Delhi Minorities Commission has said that the riots were sparked by inflammatory remarks by BJP leaders, including Mishra.

Scroll reviewed six applications filed before magistrate courts in 2020 asking for FIRs to be registered against Mishra. All the complainants allege that Mishra played a direct and active role in inciting violence against Muslim communities during the riots.

Five of the complaints also alleged police complicity. All the complainants alleged that when they went to their local police stations to file FIRs against Mishra, other local BJP leaders and police personnel, the authorities refused to take any action.

Also read: The futile, five-year struggle to lodge an FIR against Kapil Mishra