A 2017 video of Samajwadi Party politician Mavia Ali making a controversial remark about being a Muslim first and an Indian second has resurfaced in the wake of the anti-Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) protests. Ali's remarks were against the Uttar Pradesh state government's directive that year to record Independence Day celebrations in madrassas in the state.
Furthermore recent viral posts have misidentified Ali as Congress leader Nasimuddin Siddiqui.
Mavia Ali was with the Congress in 2016 when he won the Deoband seat and was elected to the Uttar Pradesh Legislative Assembly in a by-election in February that year. In 2017's UP Assembly elections, Ali represented the Samajwadi Party and lost to a Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) candidate.
The 25 second long clip shows Ali saying, "firstly I am Muslim. I am an Indian in the second number. If any law clashes with the ideology of Islam, then I am with Islam. I am not ready to abide by the constitution or law. We are not loyal to the country, but we are the leaders of it. Dogs are faithfuls."
The video is viral on Facebook with the caption, "कांग्रेस का आला नेता नस्सिमुद्दीन सिद्दीकी कह रहा है "हम पहले मुसलमान है ..बाद में हिंदुस्तानी ..इस्लाम से टकराने वाले संविधान को भी हम नहीं मानेंगे ..हम इस देश के वफ़ादार नहीं है ..कुत्ते वफ़ादार होते है" कहाँ है दोनों भाईं बहन @RahulGandhi & @priyankagandhi."
Verified handles identify Mavia Ali as Congress leader Nasimuddin Siddiqui
The same video has been tweeted by multiple verified handles, including Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) Spokesperson Sambit Patra and Canadian Twitter influencer Tarek Fatah. However, Patra and Fatah later clarified that the video is of Mavia Ali and not Siddiqui.
Below is Tarek Fatah's tweet.
Fact Check
Upon relevant keyword searches, BOOM came across the same video, that featured in an India Today news bulletin, three years ago. According to the report, Mavia Ali made the controversial statements about giving precedence to the Islamic law instead of following the Indian Constitution on August 14, 2017, after the Yogi Adityanath government issued strict instructions about celebrating Independence Day in madrassas and recording the same. Ali was a Samajwadi Party leader then.
The same was covered in a prime time debate show of the channel.
Meanwhile Congress leader Nasimuddin Siddiqui is a member of the UP Legislative Assembly and has no relation to the video.