FIR registered against Congress MLA Shakuntala Khatik for inciting people to burn down a police station
A case has been registered against Congress legislator Shakuntala Khatik for allegedly inciting people to set ablaze a police station, amid violent protests by farmers in Madhya Pradesh. A video, which recently went viral, purportedly showed Ms Khatik inciting people to set a police station on fire.
The video was shot on June 8 when Ms Khatik, who represents Karera Assembly segment in Madhya Pradesh's Shivpuri district, was staging a protest near the Karera Police Station against the killing of farmers in Mandsaur.
Karera's Sub-Divisional Officer of Police (SDOP) Anurag Sujania said an FIR was registered against Ms Khatik, block Congress president Venus Goyal and others today.
A case against the Congress MLA and others has been registered under IPC sections pertaining to rioting, unlawful assembly, punishment for obscene acts or words in public and assault or criminal force to deter a public servant from discharging his duty, he said.
On June 8, Ms Khatik was leading a protest march during which an effigy of Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan was burnt. The police poured water on the effigy in a bid to douse the flames, in which the woman legislator got partially drenched. This irked Ms Khatik, who later sat on a protest near the police station along with her supporters and the video was shot during the sit-in. The video showed the MLA purportedly asking her supporters to set the police station on fire.
The farmers' protest in Madhya Pradesh, which began on June 1, took a violent turn on June 6 when five cultivators were killed in police firing in Mandsaur district. Subsequently, the farmers' protests witnessed bandh and arson as the agitation spread to other districts in western Madhya Pradesh, including Neemuch, Dhar, Ratlam and Jhabua.
Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan had launched an indefinite fast in Bhopal on Saturday with an appeal for peace and met farmer leaders. However, he ended his fast on Sunday saying peace has returned to the state.
Before ending the fast, he assured people that those involved in the deaths of farmers in Mandsaur would be punished.