Social media company Facebook on Thursday took down the account of the gunman who shot a student of Jamia Millia Islamia University in Delhi in the afternoon during a protest against the Citizenship Amendment Act.

The gunman had livestreamed parts of the protest right before he fired at Shadab Farooq. The demonstrators were marching towards Rajghat – Mahatma Gandhi’s memorial – when the incident occurred.

“There is no place on Facebook for those who commit this kind of violence,” a spokesperson told Scroll.in. “We have removed the gunman’s Facebook account and are removing any content that praises, supports or represents the gunman or the shooting as soon as we identify it.”

Also read:

  1. ‘Jamia firing a direct result of provocative remarks by BJP leaders’: Opposition hits out at BJP
  2. Jamia shooting: What we know about Ramgopal Bhakt, who posted live Facebook videos before firing
  3. Follow the live updates of the aftermath of the shooting

Union Home Minister Amit Shah said he had spoken to Delhi Police Commissioner Amulya Patnaik about the firing, and assured that strict action would be taken against the culprit. “Central government will not tolerate any such incident, it will be taken seriously and the culprit will not be spared,” he added.

The incident occurred on the heels of several Bharatiya Janata Party leaders’ provocative remarks about anti-Citizenship Amendment Act protestors. A video of Union minister Anurag Thakur seemingly encouraging the crowd to shoot protestors went viral earlier this week. On Thursday, he was banned from campaigning for three days by the Election Commission.

BJP leader Parvesh was prohibited for campaigning for four days for saying that “lakhs of protestors” gathering in the city’s Shaheen Bagh locality to demonstrate against the citizenship law would enter their homes to “rape their sisters and daughters and kill them”. The gunman who shot Farooq had reportedly shouted “Shaheen Bagh, game over”.

Last week, the Election Commission had imposed a 48-hour campaigning ban BJP leader Kapil Mishra for suggesting that the elections would be like an “India vs Pakistan match”.