india

Updated: Jul 08, 2019 17:25 IST

The Ramgarh district administration in Jharkhand said it will take legal action after hundreds of Muslims gathered at a school on Monday to protest mob lynchings in the state.

“Videography of the meeting was done. The process of lodging FIR will be initiated soon,” Ramgarh superintendent of police Prabhat Kumar said after the group met at Chitarpur High School in Ramgarh district, around 50-km east of state capital Ranchi.

A section of Muslims from Chitarpur block had sought permission for a rally from Idgah ground to Main Road from the administration. Earlier, the administration had given permission with certain condition.

However, the permission was cancelled on Sunday evening in the wake of recent violence following rallies by Muslims against lynchings in state.

On Friday, a joint group of Muslim organizations, which took out a protest rally in the state capital Ranchi against the recent lynching of a young man named Tabrez Ansari in Saraikela, vandalized a bus of Central Institute of Psychiatry (CIP) in the heart Ranchi.

The Ramgarh administration had also invoked prohibitory orders under Section 144 of the Criminal Procedure Code (CrPC) on the route of the rally and banned all kinds of protest activities such as demonstration, meeting and rally.

Also read: Jharkhand’s minority panel seeks compensation for kin after attack on 24-year-old Muslim man

In the prohibition order, it was mentioned that Ramgarh had been sensitive to the issues like mob lynching and communal clash. It further said, “It was found some unscrupulous elements trying to disturb the peace and harmony of the society during such rallies in other parts of the state.”

“We were denied permission for the rally, which we followed. But, we were given permission for a meeting after our request on Sunday night,” the chief speaker at the meeting Sahjada Anwar, said.

Ramgarh police chief Prabhat Kumar, however, said no such permission was given to them. “The community members had requested permission for the meeting after dropping the idea of rally. But, we did not give any permission for such a programme. We felt the meeting was a violation of administrative order and legal action will be taken accordingly,” the SP said.

Anwar, who is also an All India Congress Committee (AICC) member and fought assembly elections twice from Ramgarh assembly constituency, claimed, “It was a peaceful meeting that requested the government to implement Supreme Court directives against mob lynching.”

He said the Supreme Court had directed every state including Jharkhand to review the cases of mob lynching every three months by the home secretary and director general of police and constitution of a task force for preventing such incidents. “But, nothing was done in the state in this regard,” he said.