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101 adults arrested, 9 minors detained in Palghar lynching case

Maharashtra Home Minister Anil Deshmukh warns against giving incident a communal colour

LynchedImage Courtesy:thequint.com

The Palghar police have nabbed 110 people in the matter of the lynching by villagers of three men that took place there on Thursday night. This includes 101 adults who have been remanded to custody and 9 minors who have also been detained in connection with the case. Anil Deshmukh, the Home Minister of Maharashtra warned against communalising the incident and said that an enquiry had been ordered in the matter, reported The Indian Express.

Gaurav Singh, Police Superintendent of Palghar said that the investigation was currently focused on identifying the sources of rumours that spread in the tribal village of Gadchinchle where the incident took place after the villagers allegedly mistook the victims to be thieves and lynched them.

“An inquiry will soon be conducted to ascertain what measures were taken by policemen who reached the scene and had taken the victims into a police van,” he said.

The victims, identified as two sadhus of the Juna Akhara, Chike Maharaj Kalpavruksh Giri (70) and Sushilgiri Maharaj (35) were seen wearing faded saffron dhotis and kurtas in the video of the incident that was being circulated. They were identified as being from an ashram in Kandivali who were travelling to Surat to attend a funeral. The third victim was Nilesh Telgade (30), the driver of the van they were travelling in.

The 101 adults arrested are in 12-day police custody and the 9 minors have been sent to an observation home.

In his tweet, state home minister Anil Deshmukh said that the police fired two rounds and yet the crowd did not come under control. He said that there were some people who were trying to take advantage of the incident by giving it a political twist through a communal angle.

Twitter had gone abuzz with hashtags like #JusticeforHinduSadhus and several right-wing leaders expressed their displeasure over the incident. Some Hindutva associated handles then tried to instigate a communal angle prompting Deshmukh to tweet that the attackers and the victims belonged to the same religion.

In this matter, the Inspector General of Police (Konkan Range) also suspended two policemen, Kasa Police station’s Assistant police inspector Anandrao Kale and sub-inspector Sudhir Katare, for alleged dereliction of duty. CM Uddhav Thackeray said, “The Palghar incident has been acted upon. The police have arrested all those accused who attacked the 2 sadhus, 1 driver and the police personnel, on the day of the crime itself.” Uddhav Thackeray added, “Nobody guilty in this heinous crime and shameful act will be spared and they will be brought to justice in the strongest way possible.”
 

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