Team Clarion
NEW DELHI — A leader of the Bharatiya Janta Party’s youth wing BJYM (Bharatiya Janata Yuva Morcha) is among four persons arrested for lynching three Muslim men in Chhattisgarh’s Raipur as they were transporting buffaloes.
Raja Agarwal, who describes himself as the publicity chief of the BJP Yuva Morcha in Raipur, was arrested on 23 June from Devri located on the border of Chhattishgarh and Maharashtra, reports reaching here said on Wednesday.
Agarwal, a resident of Jhalap village in Mahasamund, was hiding there for a week and was looking for a chance to flee from the area.
On his Facebook timeline, Agarwal posted a video showing a truck reportedly transporting cattle being chased. He also posted a video of a rope of nails.
On 7 June, the three Muslim men from Uttar Pradesh — Chand Miya Khan (23), Guddu Khan (35) and Saddam Qureshi (23) — were brutally attacked by a Hindutva mob while transporting cattle from Chhattisgarh’s Mahasamund to the state capital. The trio were attacked on the Mahanadi river bridge in Arang and assaulted by the cow vigilante mob.
Chand Miya and Guddu Khan died on the spot and their bodies were thrown into the river while Qureshi succumbed to his injuries 12 days later.
On the arrest of Agarwal, journalist Alishan Jafri said: “No lynching is spontaneous. These are cold blooded political murders and should be seen as such. Why is it always supporters of only one party who are actively involved in all kinds of communal violence?”
The two other men arrested on Tuesday are Mahasamund residents (the incident took place on the Raipur-Mahasamund border) Navin Singh Thakur, and Mayank Sharma. Thakur works as a driver while the latter is a goods transporter, police said. Earlier, Harsh Sharma was arrested on 22 June.
An FIR has been registered against unknown people under Sections 307 (punishment for attempt to murder) and 304 (culpable homicide not amounting to murder) of the IPC.
The police are facing criticism for invoking the charges of culpable homicide instead of murder. They are also facing flak for delayed actions against the culprits. The four arrests were made only after hundreds of Muslim had protested and courted arrest demanding the immediate action against the culprits on Friday.
