A Station House Officer (SHO) of Rewa district was on Friday removed after he was seen in a video thrashing a priest at a temple.
It was reported that the priest was performing puja on Ramnavmi despite prohibitive provisions in place due to novelcorona virus threat on Thursday. The police reportedly dispersed the mob after landing at the temple in Dhekha colony.
The SHO, Rajkumar Mishra was seen in a photo thrashing the priest with his stick and also threw away the articles used for the prayers at local Devi temple.After the picture went viral in social media, the Inspector General of Police Rewa Chanchal Shekhar line attached the SHO. Early in the day, senior BJP leader Gopal Bhargav had taken to twitter on Friday sharing pictures of the police officer beating up the priest with stick. “A police officer without putting on shoes close to havan vedi is threatening a lonely priest and I can’t see anyone nearby.”
Bhargav had demanded from CM Shivraj Singh Chouhan proper action against the said ‘indecent’ officer. Sources claimed that the locals had also complained to DGP Vivek Jauhri about this police excess. Besides the local MLA and the former minister Rajendra Shukl too had approached senior police officers on this incident. “The IG Rewa has informed the State Government that the action at Rewa temple was undertaken after information of a gathering.
The police officer seen in the pictures is not SP Abid Khan and SHO has been removed for improper action,” said a tweet from the publicity department of MP.
The Congress party had flayed the Shivraj government for assault on the priest. Cautioning the CM Chouhan not to be carried away by power, Congress leader Siddharth Tiwari had questioned the ‘inhuman’ treatment meted out to the temple priest. MP Congress too had tweeted about Rewa incident and questioned what kind of message Shivraj government wanted to convey by getting a lonely priest thrashed by police.
The viral pics of the incident are showing priest alone on the scene and the locals claimed that seeing police in action, the devotees had fled the temple.
Notably, in Rewa district on Thursday, police had booked close to 50 persons who were found gathering at different mosques for offering prayers despite probation on mass gatherings over Covid19 scare.