delhi

Updated: May 29, 2017 23:42 IST

Suspecting transportation of beef, a group people set on fire a vehicle carrying animal bones in the jungles of Aravallis in Faridabad late on Saturday. The vehicle was on its way to Hapur in UP from Bhadkal in Faridabad.

Police said the mob from Anangpur village in Surajkund beat up the driver and drove the Tata 407 to the jungles where they set it on fire. Two fire tenders were rushed to the area to control the fire.

“We case against over 50 people, mostly youth from the village under different provisions of IPC and SC/ST Act. We arrested five of them who were produced in court,” said a police officer.

The arrested men are Nishant, Sagar, Parveen, Kuldeep and Deepak—all in their 20s -- of Anangpur village.

“We found that the contractor had licence from the Municipal Corporation of Faridabad to lift dead animals in Faridabad,” the police official said.

“I was on a scooty following my Tata 407 when someone abruptly kept his vehicle in front of it and directed my driver to come down,” said Karjan Singh, who claimed he had got contract from MCF to lift dead animals.

A resident of Molarband village in Delhi, Singh said the youths beat his driver and took the vehicle to the jungles where they set it on fire.

“Bad smell comes out from vehicles transporting animal bones. The youths at Anangpur chowk suspected that our canter was carrying beef. My driver and I said we had permission to carry animal bones but they did not pay heed to our pleas,” Karjan told Hindustan Times.

MCF officials confirmed they auction areas to contractors to pick up dead animals. “ We have allotted proper sites on the Faridabad-Gurgaon road to such contractors to dump such dead animals,” said an official of MCF.

In Faridabad there are three such contractors.

“We take the skin and bones of the dead animals and sell them elsewhere,” said Karjan. “Generally we transport bones to factories in Hapur, Bulandshahr and Meerut.”

Police have launched search to nab the remaining suspects. “Since the contractor and the driver are from backward classes, a case was registered under the SC/ST Act also,” Bhram Prakash of Surajkund police station, who initially investigated the case, said.