Karnataka - Mangalore   

Hindutva activists held for attacking student

MANGALORE: In what is being dubbed as a first for the district police, a team from the Mangalore North police station nabbed nine alleged Hindutva activists when they were reportedly carrying out a vigilante attack on the premises the Government First Grade College in Car Street on Wednesday.

According to the complaint filed by A.R. Suhail (20), a student of the college, he was assaulted, abused and threatened by nine persons who came to the college. The assailants, alleged Suhail, expressed their displeasure over the friendship he shares with another student of the college. The college principal called the police. “The police came to the spot within minutes and arrested the nine persons,” the complaint said.

Alleging that the attackers were from the Bajrang Dal, Assistant Superintendent of Police Amit Singh told The Hindu, “Our men reached the spot within minutes and nabbed the culprits.”

City chief of the Bajrang Dal Sharan Pumpwell denied the role of the organisation in the incident and described it as a “spontaneous action of Hindu youth”. Defending the interference of the accused in the case, he said: “It was wrong for them to enter the college premises.”

In a separate incident, the Mangalore South police thwarted an operation against so-called “forced conversion” by the Bajrang Dal late on Tuesday. According to the police, the activists tried to storm a flat in an apartment complex in the Attavara area on the premise that the residents were converting people to Christianity.

Mr. Pumpwell said, “We had no intention of storming the house. We wanted to know what was happening there. We informed the police in advance about our plans.”

He claimed that the watchman of the apartment complex had complained to the Bajrang Dal about an attempt to forcibly convert him to Christianity. “We just wanted to ascertain the veracity of the claim,” Mr. Pumpwell said. The police maintained that their timely intervention prevented things from going out of hand.

Printer friendly page  
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Stories in this Section

Hindutva activists held for attacking student
Agency ‘pressured’ to defy child welfare board
Move to privatise hospital opposed
Four Koraga families face eviction from Nanthoor

Copyright © 2009, The Hindu. Republication or redissemination of the contents of this screen are expressly prohibited without the written consent of The Hindu