The Criminal Investigation Department of Rajasthan Police has found that none of the accused in the Pehlu Khan lynching in April this year were actually involved in the attack on him.
Pehlu Khan, in his dying declaration had named Om Yadav, Hukum Chand Yadav, Sudhir Yadav, Jagmal Yadav, Naveen Sharma and Rahul Saini as his attackers.
Khan, a dairy farmer, was lynched by cow vigilantes in Alwar’s Behror area in April this year when he was transporting cows. The police have even said that not one of them was even anywhere near the place where he was beaten up. The report has recommended registration of a case against two more suspects. Seven people, who were arrested earlier, are out on bail. Two of them are juveniles.
The six people mentioned above who were named as accused by Pehlu Khan, while he was on his death bed in the hospital, have been found innocent in the investigation. The CID probe found that from the beginning, there was no evidence of their being on the spot.
“Investigation into location of their mobile phones as well as video and still photographs of the incident found that none of the six were at the place where Pehlu Khan was attacked. Two others, Deepak Yadav and Bheem Rathji, who were there and involved in the attack, have been identified and booked”, Pankaj Kumar Singh, Additional Director General, Crime, Rajasthan told India Today.
It was alleged by Kamla Didi, leader of cow vigilantes in Rajasthan, that Pehlu Khan was tutored by certain activists to name six suspects, who were protecting cows and running cow shelter.
According to one version of events, a group of vigilantes had stopped some vehicles carrying cows and taken the cattle to a cow shelter under police supervision. Another theory is that these people were just bystanders and student leaders who stopped another truck, pulled down Pehlu Khan and assaulted him. Khan, who was a heart patient, later died at the hospital.
Meanwhile, activists including those from the PUCL (People’s Union for Civil Liberties) have been demanding the arrest of the six named by Khan in his dying declaration, insisting that they were the main conspirators.
Rajasthan ADG (Crime) Pankaj Kumar Singh said it was not a planned crime, but one carried out in the heat of the moment. “So to say that the six could have deliberately avoided carrying their cell phones is wrong. Besides, cell phone is actively used by vigilantes to communicate with each other’s location of cow carrying vehicles”, Singh added.
THE STORY SO FAR
Vipin Yadav, 19, a first-year BA student at Government PG College, Behror had only recently been elected president of the college student union. Huge hoardings with his posters were put around after this victory. He was living in Behror with his maternal family whereas his parents belong to the Bhatora village in Mahendragarh district in Haryana. His mother Preeti alias Babli is a sarpanch.
Vipin stopped on seeing people gathered around some vehicles from where cattle were being taken away. The mob were talking about Muslims carrying cattle for slaughter. He is accused of leading the assault in the heat of the moment.
He was joined by two juveniles, both 17-year-old bystanders. One of them was nicknamed Mithun because he used to mimic actor Mithun Chakravarty and even beat up cow transporters and smugglers. Both were sent to juvenile homes and released later.
The other four, who have been arrested so far, include Dayanand Yadav, 47, who was on his way to buy stuff for the last rites of his father.
Two others, Kalu Ram Ahir, 44 and Yogesh alias Dholia, 30 were also bystanders who joined in the assault.
There are seven accused, who are absconding, and rewards have been announced for some of them.
None of the six gaurakshaks, who were named by Pehlu Khan, are viewed as primarily suspects for want of evidence. They don’t figure in any video obtained so far.
One version says that while the six took cattle from four vehicles to a cow shelter, the mob took over when Vipin Yadav chased two more vehicles carrying cattle. Pehlu Khan was injured in this attack on two vehicles.
HOW EVENT UNFOLDED
According to the police, those carrying cattle were not transporters but smugglers because they did not have any permit to transport cattle to another state, in this case Haryana. Cops said they had evidence of ‘purchase as sale receipt’ in case of only two cattle. Investigation so far has confirmed that only some of the 38 cattle being transported were sold at the municipal corporation, at Jaipur’s trade fair and a few were milch cattle. The rest, it appeared, were being taken for slaughter.
The police said Pehlu Khan’s son Irshad had two cases of smuggling cows in Haryana. “For us, Pehlu Khan was also an accused. Had he survived, he would have been convicted”, a police officer told India Today.
COW PROTECTION AN EMOTIONAL ISSUE
Cow has been always an emotional issue. The Yadavs, traditionally known as protectors of cows, belong to the OBC caste who have a sizeable presence around Behror. A number of accused in the Pehlu Khan murder case are Yadavs. The mob mentality to lynch someone has been prevalent in Indian society for quite some time. Police say the assaulters in Pehlu Khan case thought it would be heroic to do so in the name of preventing cruelty against cows.
The entire assault took place on the spur of the moment without any conspiracy. Some feel gaurakshaks are careful not to attack cow smugglers or transporters fatally, but they instigate the mob, which invariably gathers by referring to transporters, mostly Muslims as cow killers.
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Article source: http://www.espncricinfo.com/icc-champions-trophy-2017/content/story/1100820.html?CMP=OTC-RSS
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