Three more arrested for ‘forcing Dalit man to lick slippers’
POSTED ON JULY 11, 2023
Sonbhadra: Three more arrests have been made in connection with a Dalit man being allegedly thrashed by another man and then forced to lick his slippers in this district of Uttar Pradesh, police said on Monday. A video of the incident allegedly went viral on social media and the accused, a contractual employee of the electricity department, has been “dismissed from service”, he said.
Kunti Dhruva
Circle Officer (Ghorawal) Amit Kumar said three more people have been arrested, taking the total number of arrests in connection with the incident to four. All the arrests were made on Sunday evening, police said. In his complaint submitted to the police on July 8, Rajendra Chamar stated that he belonged to the Scheduled Caste (SC) category.
“On July 6, he had gone to his maternal uncle’s place where power supply was disrupted. He was trying to find the fault when Tejbali Singh Patel, a contract employee of the electricity department, started abusing him. He used casteist words to the complainant and also asked him to lick his slippers. Following this, the local people intervened,” a police officer had said on Sunday.
Based on the complaint, a case was registered against Patel under provisions of the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act and sections 323 (voluntarily causing hurt), 504 (intentional insult with intent to provoke breach of the peace) and IPC. Kumar had said, section 506 (criminal intimidation) of the Indian Penal Code.
In the video, the electricity department employee is seen twisting one arm of the complainant, pushing him to the ground, climbing on his chest and slapping him. He is also seen forcing the complainant to lick his slippers.
Kumar told PTI, “The three people who were arrested later are Ajay Patel and Ravi Yadav, who made a video of the incident and posted it on social media, and Vishram Vishwakarma, who called the three This happened after.”
Police said that accused Tejbali Singh Patel, Ajay Patel and Ravi Yadav also thrashed the complainant, threatened to kill him and took Rs 2,200 from him. “Based on this, IPC sections 386 (extortion), 355 (assault or criminal force) and 120B (criminal conspiracy) and provisions of the Information Technology Act were added to the FIR,” Kumar said. Police said that three mobile phones, two motorcycles and Rs 2,200 in cash have been recovered from the arrested accused. The incident turned into a political brawl with opposition parties criticizing the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in Uttar Pradesh.
Samajwadi Party (SP) chief Akhilesh Yadav said the incident was no less shameful than the one in Madhya Pradesh’s Sidhi district, while Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) leader Sanjay Singh claimed Dalits were not even treated as human beings under the BJP rule The living creature State Congress spokesperson Vikas Srivastava called the incident a “disgusting act”, while Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD) spokesperson Ankur Saxena accused the BJP of insulting Dalits.
Courtesy: Janta Se Rishta
Note: This news piece was originally published in jantaserishta.com and used purely for non-profit/non-commercial purposes exclusively for Human Rights
