The All India Muslim Majlise Mushawarat, the apex body of India Muslim organisations, issued a legal notice on 4 April to the BJP head Mr VK Malhotra who had recently defamed the Batla House and Jamia Nagar localities of South Delhi by claiming that they are “dens of terrorists”. The Mushawarat told Mr Malhotra in its legal notice, sent through Adv. Durga Manyu Gupta, that “you have made these statements with criminal intent to promote enmity between different groups on ground of religion, community, place of birth, residence, etc., and to incite acts prejudicial to maintenance of harmony, and you have intentionally insulted, and thereby given provocation to common people, intending and knowing it to be likely that such provocation will cause such persons to break the public peace, or to commit other offences. As such, your acts of making and publicising the aforesaid defamatory, malicious and provocative statements are offences under law”.
The legal notice asked Malhotra to tender an unconditional public apology, particularly to the residents of Jamia Nagar and publicise the same on an equal scale. It further said that failure to comply with the aforesaid demand, will force the organisation to initiate appropriate legal action.