21 people, including two policemen, were killed in the clashes between police and around 3,000 encroachers at a park in Mathura in Uttar Pradesh. The two policemen killed in the clashes were Superintendent of Police (City) Mukul Dwivedi and Station House Officer of Farah police station Santosh Kumar.
“Country-made guns, rifles, pistols & cartridges recovered from spot, search op underway. It was an unlawful assembly and they had explosives including grenades and pistols which they used to fire upon the police. They fired at police which was absolutely unprovoked. Strict action will be taken,” ADG (Law and Order) Daljeet Singh Chaudhary said.
The encroachers, members of a semi-religious sect, who called themselves as "Satyagrahis", had occupied the 260-acre park at Jawahar Bagh in Mathura, nearly 150 kilometres from Delhi, for more than two years. The cult-like group of nearly 2,000 protesters, who claims to be the “true followers of Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose”, got violent after they were asked to evict the land they were encroaching upon, following the directions of the Allahabad High Court.
"There was unprovoked firing from the members of an offshoot of the Jai Gurudev sect. Heavily armed men from the other side fired at the police," Uttar Pradesh police chief Javed Ahmed said and added that to control the crowd, the police resorted to lathicharge and tear gas shells and finally opened fire.
Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav has directed the Additional Director General of Police (Law and Order) to rush to the spot and has announced Rs. 20 lakh for the family of the deceased policemen.
The Facebook page of Swadheen Bharat Movement states, "We are true followers of Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose and we want to find out all the information and the certified documents from all governing bodies, including judiciary, legislative and executive bodies of the nation. We demand all records relating to "Ruler of the Nation", law and order and also the document of citizenship (which shows how we are the citizen of the nation) to be made public".
By Premji
