Two years after the infamous Alwar mob lynching incident, the Rajasthan Police on Saturday filed a chargesheet against the victim Pehlu Khan — a dairy farmer who died in the incident — his brother and sons in a cattle smuggling case.
The chargesheet accuses Khan of transporting cattle from Rajasthan to Haryana allegedly without the permission of the district collector.
Advertisement
Now that Pehlu Khan is no more, the case will be initiated against his brother and sons.
The police chargesheeted Khan’s sons Irsad (25) and Arif (22) under sections 5, 8 and 9 while charges have been framed against the deceased under section 6 of the Rajasthan Bovine Animal (Prohibition of Slaughter and Regulation of Temporary Migration or Export) Act, 1995.
BJP’s Gyan Dev Ahuja said that Khan and his family members were habitual offenders and were continuously involved in cow smuggling.
“All the allegations levelled against gau rakshaks and the Hindu Parishad were wrong,” he claimed.
Talking to ANI, he further claimed that the locals had just caught the vehicle which Pehlu Khan was using to smuggling cattle and that he had died in police custody.
Reacting to the filing of the chargesheet, Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot said that probe was conducted in the past during the BJP government and chargesheet was presented, adding that the case will be re-investigated if any discrepancies are found.
According to an ANI report, the chargesheet against Khan was prepared on December 30 last year, 13 days after Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot’s government came into power in Rajasthan.
In 2018, the previous BJP government in the state had filed a similar charge sheet against two associates of Khan, who were also attacked by the mob.
There were two FIRs registered in the case. One was against the mob for beating Khan to death and second against him and his family for transporting cattle (cow) illegally out of the state.
In April 2017, Pehlu Khan and four others were brutally assaulted by “gau rakshaks” on the Jaipur-Delhi National Highway while they were transporting cows they had bought in a Jaipur fair to their home in Haryana.
Khan succumbed to his injuries two days after the incident.
A video that was widely circulated in social media showed a group of men mercilessly assaulting Khan.
Later in September, the same year, six persons of the total 15 arrested in connection with the incident, were given a clean chit by the Rajasthan police.
The Crime Investigation Department – Crime Branch (CB-CID) had instructed the Rajasthan Police to remove the name of the six men from the list of accused after the investigation team did not find their involvement in the crime.
