Lakhimpur Kheri, Oct 19 (IANS) Four more persons, including a BJP leader who was seen inside the SUV that mowed down protesting farmers in Lakhimpur Kheri on October 3, have been arrested.
A statement released by Prashant Kumar, ADG (law and order) late on Monday night, said: "The accused Sumit Jaiswal, Shishupal, Nandan Singh Bisht and Satya Prakash Tripathi have been arrested by Lakhimpur Kheri Police and SWAT team of Crime branch. Licensed revolver and three bullets were recovered from Satya Prakash Tripathi and seized."
Local BJP leader Sumit Jaiswal, who was seen in a viral video escaping from the lead SUV in the convoy of vehicles that crushed the farmers, had earlier filed a murder FIR against unnamed farmers, claiming that his driver, friend and two BJP workers were beaten to death after their vehicles lost control due to heavy stone pelting and accidentally hit farmers
In the viral video, Jaiswal was seen running from the Thar SUV that drove into protesters from behind.
It may be recalled that four farmers and a journalist were run over on October 3 by a convoy of three vehicles, one of which belongs to Union Minister of state for home, Ajay Mishra Teni.
Mishra's son Ashish was arrested on October 9, five days after he was named in the FIR related to the incident on charges of murder.
The families of farmers who died in the incident, had alleged in their complaint to the police that Ashish was inside the lead SUV that crushed the farmers .
An FIR was lodged at the Tikunia police station on October 3 over the episode. Later, a counter-FIR was lodged at the same police station on the basis of a complaint by Sumit Jaiswal, who has now been arrested.
Sumit Jaiswal had also claimed that the protesters attacked Ashish Mishra's convoy, not the other way round. He also claimed the car was not moving, and it was the protesters that attacked the convoy.
"We were at the programme venue. There was an atmosphere of fear. They were armed with sticks and rocks and they kept attacking us, abusing us. They also shouted 'Khalistan Zindabad' and they climbed the car," he said.
Ashish Mishra has also denied the charge that he was at the crime scene when the murders took place. He stated that he was in his paternal village, around two km away, and stayed there all day.
A source in the security set up said that Srinagar alone recorded 16 terror-related incidents, 21 per cent of the total of 75 incidents reported from across the Valley till so far this year, leaving behind the traditional hotbed of terrorism of Pulwama, Anantnag and Shopian.
Congress chief spokesperson, Randeep Surjewala said in a statement, "The Khattar government has lost the confidence and the mandate of the people and it should leave. When your party can talk to the Taliban, why not farmers."
Researchers from National Centre for Disease Control, Delhi, under the Ministry of Health; CSIR Institute of Genomics and Integrative Biology, Delhi, and University of Cambridge in the UK examined how the Delta variant was able to evade the immune response.
Senior Superintendent of Police Swapan Sharma told the media that Babbi was in touch with the members of the Ajaib Khan gang lodged in a Sangrur jail with whom he had hatched a conspiracy to eliminate rival gangsters Mani Sheron and Feteh Nagri.
Prabhjot Singh Katri was found murdered early on Sunday morning near his residence in the city of Truro in Nova Scotia. The victim came to Canada from India in 2017 for higher studies. After finishing his studies, he was on a work visa and was driving a cab to earn his livelihood.
Demanding a law to ensure cost based remunerative price for farmers' produce, the RSS affiliate Bharatiya Kisan Sangh (BKS) will hold nationwide demonstrations on Wednesday (September 8). The BKS said that the government should give remunerative price to farmers or explain that their demand is wrong.
