Representative image

BAREILLY: A mob attacked the Karanpur outpost in Mudhapandey police station area in Moradabad late on Saturday “to teach a lesson” to a man arrested allegedly for abducting a minor girl belonging to another community. The mob roughed up the policemen on duty, took away the man forcibly and fled. After a five-hour manhunt, police managed to find the accused at around 3 am from Kashipur . The policemen were injured and had to be admitted to hospital.

Mudhapandey police station station house officer Ajay Gautam told TOI, “On May 6, the accused, Nadeem, 21, of Bujpur village had allegedly abducted a 16-year-old girl. Her father lodged an FIR against him under IPC section 364 (abduction). On May 7, we rescued the girl but Nadeem had fled by then. On Saturday, following a tip-off, we arrested him near a bus stand and he was taken to Karanpur outpost.”

According to the police, family members of the girl somehow came to know about Nadeem’s arrest. At about 10 pm on Saturday, more than 60 people reached the police outpost and asked the policemen to hand over the accused to them as they wanted “to teach him a lesson”.

“Before the two constables on duty at the outpost could inform their seniors, the mob barged into the outpost and forcibly took away Nadeem. The people also thrashed the policemen and vandalised the outpost. We immediately sent a police force at the outpost and launched a manhunt. After conducting raids on several places, we finally found Nadeem. He was injured and we took him to hospital,” the SHO said.

Police said they had arrested three people who were identified as Ramesh, Ramveer and Dhrampal for abducting Nadeem and thrashing the policemen. “We have lodged an FIR against 60 unknown accused while three known who have been arrested,” said Gautam.