Amidst remark of the apex court that do police act in a similar way in other murder cases, sending an ‘invitation’ to the accused to come before them, the Kheri police, on Friday, still preferred to serve another notice on the Union minister’s son, Ashish Mishra, asking him to now appear before them on Saturday morning.
The apex court, while expressing it unhappiness over the manner in which the UP police had handled the probe into the Kheri violence so far, also commented whether the police adopted similar procedure in other murder cases, sending an `invitation’ (notice) to the accused to appear before them or went ahead with their arrest.
Ashish Mishra did not turn up before the police on Friday and after waiting for him for two hours the police served another notice on the Union minister’s son to appear on Saturday.
Union minister Ajay Mishra Teni claimed that his son failed to appear before the investigating team on Friday as he was not well.
Interestingly, while senior officers on Thursday claimed to be searching Ashish Mishra and pasted a notice at his house, Ajay Mishra Teni on Friday claimed that his son was not absconding and was present at home.
However, questions were raised that if Ajay Mishra was making true claims that his son, whom the Kheri police are searching, was present in the house, why the police team preferred the return just by pasting a notice at his residence on Thursday instead of grilling the alleged murder accused at least to find out the facts.
Interestingly, on Friday, some officers even floated an input that Ashish had slipped to Nepal and that his last mobile location on Thursday evening was traced in Gaurifanta at Indo-Nepal border. They also said that even the location of Ankit Das, nephew of former Bahujan Samaj Party MP Akhilesh Das, was also traced at some place and it seemed both together slipped to Nepal.
Both Ashish and Ankit are close friends and were allegedly present in the Thar and SUV, respectively, when the vehicles went crushing the farmers last Sunday.
The above inputs, however, have been contradicted by Union minister Ajay Mishra who claimed that his son was at home and would appear before the police to reply to their queries on Saturday morning.
It may be mentioned that Ashish Mishra, who was summoned by police in connection with the probe into the Lakhimpur Kheri violence, did not report at the designated place on Friday and later his father claimed that he could not do so for health reasons.
"My son was summoned yesterday, but due to health reasons he could not report to the police. He will report tomorrow," the Union minister told reporters outside the airport in Lucknow on Friday.
The Kheri police have already arrested two accused in connection with Lakhimpur Kheri violence. The arrested persons have been identified as Luvkush and Ashish Pandey.
The Kheri police on Monday filed an FIR for murder against Ashish Mishra. Samyukta Kisan Morcha (SKM), an umbrella body of several farmer unions, alleged that Ashish Mishra, son of Union Minister of State for Home Ajay Mishra Teni, arrived with three vehicles around the time when the farmers were dispersing from their protest at the helipad and mowed down farmers and towards the end also attacked SKM leader Tajinder Singh Virk directly by trying to run a vehicle over him.
However, Ashish Mishra denied SKM's allegation and said he was not present at the spot where the incident took place.