Police detain Class 12 student in connection with Alwar lynching

The Alwar police have detained a 17-year-old boy for allegedly being part of the mob that assaulted Pehlu Khan on April 1, which resulted in the 55-year-old dairy farmer’s death.

According to the police, the accused was identified on the basis of a video of the lynching which had gone viral on the social media .

“We detained the accused on Tuesday from his village, Dheekwal. We have learnt that following the attack, the boy had gone into hiding and was evading the police,” said Parmal Singh, circle officer, Behror and the investigating officer in the case.

“In the video, the accused, who is a student of Class 12, can be clearly seen assaulting Khan. During the preliminary investigation, we learnt that he was passing through the area and saw the crowd beating up Khan and he joined the mob,” said Singh.

The police said that the juvenile accused has been sent to a government observational and child home in Alwar.

Khan and four other Muslims were attacked in Rajasthan’s Alwar district by alleged gau rakshaks when they were transporting cows and calves in two trucks cows bought from a Jaipur cattle market.

Khan, who died of his injuries two days later in a hospital, had told police that they had been assaulted by a group of men even though they had a permit to transport the animals.

Police registered a case of culpable homicide against six named and 200 unnamed accused of lynching the five men.

On April 3, when Khan passed away in the hospital, the section of culpable homicide was replaced with the section for murder (Section 302 of the Indian Penal Code).

So far, the police have arrested six men in the case. However, none of the arrested men were named in Khan’s FIR. The six named accused are still absconding.

The CBI on Wednesday arrested the Mumbai Income Tax (I-T) commissioner, global giant Essar group’s MD and four others in a bribery case. The I-T official allegedly accepted money in exchange of passing an order favouring the group’s associate.

According to the FIR, BB Rajendra Prasad, who was posted as commissioner of Mumbai I-T department (Appeals -30) had recently passed an order in an appeal favouring Balaji trust, which had links with the Essar group. “This trust, through a chartered accountant (Shreyas Parikh) had agreed to pay a hefty bribe running into crores as illegal gratification to BB Rajendra Prasad on his demand for a favourable order in the matter,” the CBI said.

The probe agency said Prasad had allegedly demanded a bribe of almost ₹2 crore. “CBI laid a trap and caught the said commissioner (Prasad) who had received part of the bribe — ₹19.34 lakh — from a real estate trade agent (Suresh Jain). Both the commissioner and Jain were arrested. During investigation, the remaining amount of ₹1.50 crore(approximately), earlier received by Jain on behalf of the commissioner was also recovered,” CBI said in a statement.

The FIR states that Essar group managing director Pradip Mittal, was monitoring and felicitated the handing over of bribe to Prasad. The probe agency has also arrested Vipin Bajpai, an accounts officer in the company.

Essar, however, denied the charges against its executives. “We deny all allegations regarding any misconduct by our executives. Our executives are innocent. We are confident that upon investigations the CBI will come to the same conclusion,” Manish Kedia, senior V-P of corporate affairs, Essar Services India Private Limited, said.

During preliminary investigation, we learnt that he (the minor accused) was passing through the area and saw the crowd beating up Khan and he joined the mob.