Police have registered a case against unknown people who allegedly offered namaz at the LuLu Mall here, and put under informal house arrest a Hindutva leader who had threatened to recite from the Ramayan at the mall on Friday evening.

The FIR was lodged on Thursday night, invoking penal sections 153A (promoting enmity between groups) and 295A (outraging religious feelings), on a complaint from mall authorities who stressed that no religious activities are allowed there. They clarified that those seen offering namaz in a video were not their employees, the police said.

Shishir Chaturvedi, leader of the regional outfit Akhil Bharat Hindu Mahasabha, had created a furore over the video clip, bringing chief minister Yogi Adityanath under pressure from Right-wing groups that normally lionise him.

Adityanath, a known patron of the mall built by Yussuffali M.A. from Kerala who runs the Abu Dhabi-headquartered LuLu Group, had last year banned religious activities in public places.

The video shows purported shoppers walking around the seven or eight people offering namaz, suggesting the site was a public area.

Chaturvedi, who had agitated outside the mall gate on Thursday, told reporters on Friday morning: “We have seen a second video showing two people offering namaz in the mall.”

He added: “We had said on Thursday that we would recite from the Sundar Kand (of the Ramayan) as well as the Gayatri Mantra and Hanuman Chalisa at the mall if anybody was found offering namaz there again. Now nobody can stop us from doing Hindu puja there.”

He said he would do so at 6pm on Friday. Soon after, policemen surrounded Chaturvedi’s home and said he wouldn’t be allowed to move out. The police did not officially declare a house arrest, and the Mahasabha leader continued meeting reporters at his home.

“They may have stopped me today but they cannot stop me forever. Very soon you will see me there, praying to our gods and goddesses, if the guilty are not brought to book,” he said.

The mall authorities put up notices at several places in the facility on Friday declaring: “No religious prayers will be permitted in the mall.”

Rajesh Kumar Srivastava, additional deputy commissioner of police, south Lucknow, said: “We have registered a case against unidentified people for conducting religious activity in the mall against its rules on the basis of a complaint from Sebtain Husain, public relations officer of the LuLu Mall. He has said the people seen in the video don’t belong to the mall.”

Srivastava said the police were probing both videos and trying to identify those seen offering namaz.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Adityanath had reportedly been keen on bringing the mall, one of the biggest in north India, to Lucknow.

Yussuffali had been invited to an investors’ summit inaugurated by Modi in Lucknow on June 4. Adityanath, who inaugurated the mall on July 10, had earlier visited the site to see the progress of the construction.