A controversy erupted over the beautification of the 1993 Mumbai blast convict Yakub Memon’s grave, which has been revamped with marble boundary and LED lighting. The body of Memon was buried at the Muslim cemetery of Bada Kabarastan in the Marine Lines area of Mumbai after he was hanged in 2015. The Bada Kabarastan is maintained by the Juma Masjid trust and falls under the jurisdiction of the Burial Waqf Board.
After the matter came to light, the Maharashtra government ordered a probe into the matter. A DCP level officer will probe how the LED lights and marble tiles came to adorn the terror convict’s grave. The LED lighting around Memon’s grave was removed on September 8. The workers of the Bada Kabarastan have claimed that the lighting was done as part of the celebrations of Shab-e-Baraat. As stated by the Bada Kabarastan officials:
It is an old video. On Shab-e-Baraat lighting is installed in the whole graveyard. Jama Masjid and Mumbai Trust take care of its maintenance.
Meanwhile, National Conference (NC) leader Mustafa Kamal has said that the beautification of Memon’s grave is a display of love by the Muslims.
“It’s a display of love. It neither weakens religion nor is it wrong. He died. Those who were pained will give themselves to this grave”, Kamal said.
Yakub Memon was convicted by the special court under the Terrorist and Disruptive Activities (Prevention) Act (TADA) in the 1993 Mumbai blasts. On March 12, 1993, Islamic terrorists attacked Mumbai city with a series of 12 bomb blasts in which 257 people lost their lives and 1,400 were injured. Yakub’s brother Tiger Memon was the main accused in the case. The attacks were coordinated by Dawood Ibrahim, who runs the organized crime syndicate D-company. Dawood is wanted by India and is designated as a global terrorist by the United Nations (UN). In 2007, the TADA court sentenced Yakub Memon to death. Yakub was hanged at Nagpur central jail on July 30, 2015.
The funeral was joined by a large number of Muslims from Mumbai and surrounding areas. As per reports, to accommodate the swelling crowd, two sets of funeral prayers were organized, one at the Mahim dargah and one at the funeral ground. The Mumbai police allowed the Muslims to participate in the funeral of Yabub but refused to allow his face to be uncovered for one last glimpse. All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) chief and Hyderabad MP Asaduddin Owaisi in 2015 had said Memon was punished because he was a Muslim. Later in 2019 while talking about the hanging of Memon, Owaisi said that the death penalty in India disproportionately impacts Muslims.
