Mild lathi-charge by police after crowd tries to stop land exercise in Deoria
SP Sankalp Sharma said the police had identified the troublemakers and that stringent action would be taken against them for creating hindrances in official duty.
There was mild unrest in Deoria’s Fatehpur village, where five of a family were killed by a mob after the murder of a village strongman on October 2, when revenue officials went there for a land exercise on Monday.
When revenues officials led by a tehsildar reached the village for land demarcation, hundreds of supporters of former zilla parishad member Premchand Yadav, who was one of six people who were killed, surrounded his house. Amid rumors that the officials had started a demolition exercise, they staged a protest, police officials said.
This led to police deploying personnel from neighbouring police stations in the area who resorted to a mild lathi-charge to disperse the unruly crowd. The police also sealed the village border and banned the entry of outsiders.
Deoria superintendent of police Sankalp Sharma said the police had identified the troublemakers and that stringent action would be taken against them for creating hindrances in official duty. He said normalcy was restored and that additional force had been deployed in the village.
It might be noted Yadav was locked in a land dispute with one late Satya Prakash Dubey’s family. After Yadav’s murder, five members of Dubey’s family were killed in a retaliation attack allegedly by Yadav’s supporters.
Police officials have, so far, arrested 21 people in connection with the violence, including prime suspect Navnath Mishra, and recovered the firearm that was used in the heinous killings. Navnath Mishra served as the bodyguard and driver of Yadav.
Revenue officials had on Thursday served notices on three persons, including Yadav, and had directed them to respond within 48 hours before illegal constructions can be removed on an encroached land. Responding to the notice, members of Yadav’s family filed their reply in the local tahsildar’s court, which had decided to take up the matter for hearing on Monday.
Chief revenue officer Rajnish Rai said the demarcation of agricultural and residential lands had been done, and the issue of demolition of the portion constructed on encroached land was yet to be decided by the Tahsildar court. So far, the issue is sub-judice, he added.
