The Lucknow Police has transferred three senior officers, suspended five police personnel and arrested 16 people in connection with the harassment of a woman near a flooded underpass in Gomtinagar.
Referring to the incident and the police action, Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath targeted Samajwadi Party in the Assembly recently. The CM said “inke liye bullet train chalegi, uski tyari ki ja rahi hai (Will run bullet train for them… preparations are being made for it)” after naming two “top accused Pawan Yadav and Mohammad Arbaz”.
A video on social media showed a group of men splashing water on a motorcycle as it wades through the waterlogged road. The men quickly surround the motorcycle and some start pulling it from behind. While the man driving the motorcycle tries to push through, at least one of the accused gropes the woman who is riding pillion.
According to the Indian Express, the 16 arrested have been identified as Pawan Yadav, Sunil Kumar Bari, Mohammad Arbaz, Viraj Sahu, Arjun Agrihari, Ratan Gupta, Aman Gupta, Anil Kumar, Piyanshu Sharma, Ashish Singh, Vikas Bhandari, Manish Kumar Saroj, Abhishek Tiwari, Krishna Kant Gupta, Jai Kishan, and Abhishek Sahu.
“They have been booked for attempting to outrage the modesty of a woman, rioting and other offences. Three police teams have been formed to identify the accused and arrest them,” Deputy Commissioner of Police (Lucknow) Raveena Tyagi told Indian Express.
Five police personnel have also been suspended. They included the SHO of Gomti Nagar police station, Deepak Kumar Pandey; sub-inspector Rishi Vivek, the in-charge of the local police outpost; sub-inspector Kapil Kumar; and constables Dharamveer and Virendra Kumar.
In a press statement, Lucknow Police said three senior police officers, including Deputy Commissioner of Police Prabal Pratap Singh, Assistant Deputy Commissioner of Police Amit Kumawat, and Assistant Commissioner of Police Anshu Jain have been removed from their posts.
The accused were booked under sections 191(2) (rioting) and 74 (assault or use of criminal force with intent to outrage modesty) and other provisions of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, the police statement said.
The action was taken in line with the Uttar Pradesh government’s zero-tolerance policy. “On CM Yogi’s instructions, DCP East, ADCP East, and ACP Gomtinagar have been removed from their posts for negligence with immediate effect. Furthermore, the inspector of Gomtinagar, the in-charge of Samtamulak Chowki, and all the policemen at the Chowki have been suspended,” read a government press note.
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