New Delhi: A second charge sheet has been filed in the Lakhimpur Kheri case where an SUV — allegedly driven by the son of a Union Minister — ploughed into a crowd of protesters last year. While the first chargesheet named Ashish Mishra, son of Union Minister Ajay Mishra, over four farmers and a journalist who got run over, the second one involves the violence that followed, in which two BJP workers and the driver of the SUV were beaten to death.
Seven farmers were arrested by the police during their investigations in this case, but it is not clear year if all of them have been charged with murder.
The second police case was filed after a complaint by one Sumit Jaiswal, a local BJP worker, against unnamed farmers, accusing them of instigating the violence.
In cellphone videos that were widely circulated, Sumit Jaiswal was seen running from one of the SUVs that hit the farmers. He was later arrested as a co-accused in the case naming Ashish Mishra, the son of Junior Home Minister Ajay Mishra.
Ashish Mishra and 12 others have been arrested and they face charges of murder and conspiracy.
Earlier this month, the Special Investigation Team probing the Lakhimpur Kheri incident submitted a 5,000-page chargesheet against 14 people to a local court, saying Ashish Mishra was at the spot during the incident.
Contrary to what the minister and his son claimed, Ashish Mishra was inside one of the SUVs involved in the attack on protesting farmers and the journalist, the chargesheet has claimed.
The Special Investigation Team has told the court that the killing of the farmers and the journalist was a “planned conspiracy” with intent to commit murder and not a case of death by negligence.
With the minister yet to resign, the Congress has accused the BJP-led government of protecting him and his son.
Eight people – including four farmers and a journalist — were killed on October 3 at Lakhimpur Kheri during a farmers’ protest. An SUV going at a high speed – allegedly driven by Ashish Mishra – had rammed the protesters from behind. Violence broke out soon after, in which three others, two of them BJP workers, were killed.
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