Man beaten to death in Alwar on suspicion of smuggling cows; 2 held

Yash Goyal

Jaipur, July 21

A man was allegedly lynched by a group of people on suspicion that he was smuggling cows in Alwar district of Rajasthan, a police official said on Saturday.

Akbar Khan, 28, and another man were taking two cows to their village in Haryana through a forest area near Lalawandi in Alwar district on Friday night, when a group of people severely thrashed Khan, Ramgarh police station SHO Subhash Sharma said.

The people suspected that Khan was smuggling cows but the allegation is yet to be verified, Sharma said.

The other man accompanying Khan managed to escape.

Khan was rushed to a government hospital in Ramgarh, where doctors declared him brought dead. The body has been kept at a mortuary and the postmortem is expected to be conducted after Khan's family members reach the hospital.

Two people have been arrested and are currently being questioned, Additional Director General of Police Hemant Priyadarshi said. The suspects have been identified as Dharmendra Yadav and Paramjeet Singh.

Chief Minister Vasundhara Raje, who is preparing to receive BJP President Amit Shah at the Jaipur airport, called the incident “unfortunate".

“The incident of alleged lynching of a person transporting bovines in Alwar district is condemnable. Strictest possible action shall be taken against the perpetrators,” Vasundhara said in her tweet.

Home Minister GC Kataria, who was attending BJP President Amit Shah's lecture series here at Totuka Bhawan, told reporters that police were currently investigating “if the two men were cow smugglers” and that those “found guilty of the crime would not be spared”.

The incident happened a little more than a year after Pehlu Khan, a dairy farmer, was lynched by cow vigilantes in the district, He was transporting cattle to his village in Haryana.

Pehlu Khan died at a hospital two days after the incident on April 3 last year. He was attacked as the mob suspected him of smuggling cattle.

Over the past year, several such attacks have happened in Alwar. Cow vigilante groups have targeted people transporting cattle. Umar Khan, 35, was found dead near railway tracks in the district in November. His family members have alleged that he was killed by cow vigilantes.

Earlier this month, the Supreme Court had described the cases of lynching by cow vigilantes as a crime and not merely a law and order problem. It put the onus on the states to check such incidents, saying no one can take law into their hands.

In September last year, the apex court had directed all state governments to appoint a senior police officer as a nodal officer in each district to ensure that incidents of cow vigilantism are prevented and dealt with effectively. With PTI