Days After Cow Vigilante Rampage in Aligarh, Forensic Report Belies Beef Allegations

The Wire

28-05-2025

New Delhi: Days after four Muslim men were waylaid and assaulted by members of Hindutva outfits in Uttar Pradesh's Aligarh on May 24 over allegations of smuggling beef, police sources have told The Wire that the meat was, in fact, not cow meat.
Dheeraj Kumar, station house officer (SHO) at the Harduaganj police station, confirmed that a forensic report has debunked the beef smuggling allegations. The samples had been sent to a government laboratory in Mathura for testing.
Earlier today (May 28), the Aligarh police posted on X that the allegations of beef smuggling are false.
थाना हरदुआगंज- अवगत कराना है कि दिनांक 24.05.25 को पनैठी साधु आश्रम मार्ग पर मीट व्यापारियों के साथ मारपीट की घटना कारित की गई, पुलिस टीम द्वारा तत्काल मौके पर पहुँचकर पीडितों को निकालकर अस्पताल में भर्ती कराया गया, दोनो ही पक्षों की तत्काल एफआईआर पंजीकृत की गई, मारपीट करने वाले… pic.twitter.com/454L86TJlz
— ALIGARH POLICE (@aligarhpolice) May 28, 2025
Notably, this was the second time in the last 15 days that the same group of men targeted the victims' meat-transporting vehicle at the same spot. This time, they also set the vehicle ablaze and blocked the highway.
New footage of the attack has emerged on social media in which the accused can be seen dragging one of the visibly unconscious victims out of a police car. The four men identified as Arbaz, Aqeel, Kadim, and Munna Khan – all residents of the Atrauli town in Aligarh – were allegedly stripped by the mob and attacked with sharp weapons, bricks, sticks and rods.
SHO Dheeraj told The Wire that the police have arrested four accused persons, including three who had been named. The fourth accused was identified through visual evidence of the attack.
They have been booked under various sections of the Bhartiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS), including 191(3) (rioting with a deadly weapon), 109 (attempt to murder), 308(5) (extortion by issuing death threats), 310(2) and (dacoity).
The four victims are understood to have been rescued by the local police after sustaining grievous injuries.
Speaking to the press, SSP Amrit Jain had said that the four men were rescued and admitted to a hospital – Deen Dayal Upadhyay Hospital – by the police. Three of them were seriously injured and are undergoing treatment at the hospital.
Following the attack, and now after the revelations by the FSL report, families of the victims have demanded that the administration arrest all the attackers and drop the counter charges against the four victims. An FIR was filed against the four Muslim men by one Vijay Bajrangi under Sections 3, 5, and 8 of the Uttar Pradesh Prevention of Cow Slaughter Act, 1955.
The FIR says that the meat-laden car was followed after a tip-off that it was carrying beef. Bajrangi has been arrested by the police, but the FIR has still not been cancelled.
Mohammad Sajid, Aqeel's brother, said that the FSL report has made it clear that the meat was 'buffalo meat', and now the counter FIR should be dropped.
'The truth is before the whole world and media. They pressed these charges to save themselves. If the government doesn't drop the fake case by itself then nothing can be more disgusting. It's a double whammy for us,' Sajid said, adding, 'We have been promised representatives of different political parties that the fake case will be dropped.'
Leaders of opposition parties like the Congress, SP, AAP and AIMIM condemned the attack and have met with families of the victims. On May 27, Nagina MP and the Bhim Army chief, Chandrashekhar Aazad, met the injured men at the Jawaharlal Nehru Hospital in Aligarh. Aazad said , 'This is a premeditated violence. It is not just an attack on the law and order of the state, but also an organised attack on the livelihood of the poor and Muslims.'
Aqeel's father Salim had previously noted that their livelihoods had been at stake for a while now. He had told The Wire in the previous report that their work had been destroyed since the Adityanath-led BJP government came to power in Uttar Pradesh.
He said that they were attacked despite having a license and despite sending samples of the meat to the police.
Meanwhile, Sajid said that the cow vigilantes have turned into an extortion gang. 'This happened 15 days ago but luckily they were saved. These people have so much impunity because of the government…This time it happened in police presence. He was pulled out of a police car. They are all the same—BJP, RSS, Bajrang Dal. They have created this goon culture to divide society in the name of Hindu Muslim. They catch and attack random Muslims and that's it. There was nothing illegal but they still attacked people.'