Eight held after man lynched over suspicion of cow slaughter

RANCHI: A day after a 38-year-old man was lynched and two people seriously hurt in a mob attack over allegations of cow slaughter in Jharkhand’s Khunti district, police lodged a first information report (FIR) into the incident.

Eight people were detained in connection with the alleged crime, but no arrests were made till Monday evening.

“An FIR has been lodged in the case, but no one has been arrested till now. More details in the case will be shared soon,” said superintendent of police, Ranchi (rural), Ashutosh Shekhar, who is also incharge of Khunti district. He said four persons have been named in the FIR apart from 18-19 unknown persons.

The three men, two belonging to the tribal Santhal community, were attacked on the border of Suari and Jaltanda villages, around 45km from state capital Ranchi, by a mob that accused them of killing of cow, police said.

The victim, Kalantus Barla, was a resident of Gopalpur village, and the two injured are Fagu Kachchap of Kathu Mahuatoli village and Philip Horo of Suari .

Villagers from Suari said that AHMEDABAD:AN unidentified man was allegedly beaten to death by seven persons on suspicion of being a thief in Gujarat’s Jamnagar, police said on Monday.

The incident took place at Moti Khavdi village on Sunday. Three people were arrested, the police said.

Police said the 35-year-old man, apparently mentally unstable, allegedly tried to enter the house of the accused on Sunday, following

Barla, who was a differently abled person, had come to his sister-in-law’s house in Suari on Saturday from Lapung.

On Sunday, the villagers said, there was of a rumour regarding child lifting gang being active in Jaltanda village. To find the child lifters, villagers reportedly reached near a river and allegedly found a cow was being slaughtered by three persons. As the villagers caught hold of them, locals from nearby villages carrying lathis assembly and started to assault them. Shekhar said the police reached the spot soon after which the accused, suspecting that the man was a thief, thrashed him, killing him on the spot, the official said. All seven work in a factory and live together in a rented house. According to police, the accused informed their manager at the factory, who called the police. A search is on for four others accused, the police official said. An FIR was lodged on Sunday against the seven accused.

being informed and took the assault victims to a local hospital, where Barla was declared brought dead and the two were admitted to different hospitals.

Kachchap, 40, denied being involved in the slaughter of cow. “I was working in my farm at Kathi Mahuatoli village. All of a sudden, I saw few people were being chased by a mob. Within a second, I found myself among the mob. One of them from the crowd shouted ‘ye bhi tha wahan (he was also there)’. Then, they started beating me brutally with lathis,” Kachchap said.