Holi celebrations in Sitapur took a communal turn as people of ‘particular community’ took an offence to being splashed colours on and beat up two brothers before resorting to pelting stones on others celebrating Holi.

Reportedly, the incident took place in Joshi Tola in Sitapur, where a group of people were celebrating Holi. At the same time, people of a ‘particular community’ came to a face-off, when some colour of Holi fell on someone who was heading towards the religious place. He got angry and claimed that people threw colours at him deliberately. At the same time, people who were in the premises of the place of worship came out and allegedly beat up one Dharmendra and Jitendra, two rickshaw drivers, following which a mob of both the communities gathered around.

Things escalated such that it led to stone-pelting. However, police reached the spot and brought matters under control. As per reports, the authorities had anticipated such clashes, since Holi fell on Friday this year and hence mosques in the region had deferred namaz timings to avoid communal clashes.

Police have filed a report against 40 people.