At a time when Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath has formed a Special Task Force to check illegal mining, the son of a BJP legislator from Bahraich killed a 10-year-old Dalit boy as his father dared to raise his voice against illegal mining by the VIP son. What is more, another 12-year-old boy who went missing since Wednesday morning was also murdered by the same accused on Thursday morning.
Surprisingly, the senior officers posted in Bahraich were informed in advance about illegal mining carried out by the MlA’s son and the threat to the Dalit family, yet they chose not to take any action.
Chetram of Bhauri in Bahraich said that Nishank Tripathi, son of BJP MlA from Payagpur (Bahraich) Subash Tripathi along with Manoj Shukla were engaged in illegal mining and took out sand from his fields. When Chetram opposed, the miscreants threatened him with life. After this, he contacted all officers, included the local SHO, SDM of Mahesi, District Magistrate and SP last Saturday and apprised them about the sequence of events seking their help in checking illegal mining.
Chetram said that when the officers refused to help, he threatened to sit on a fast unto death from Saturday to press for action against the accused.
He alleged that the accused tried to further pressure him but he refused to relent, they buried his son Karan (10) in the fields on Wednesdayevening which was later recovered. He said that Nishad (12), son of Rehmat Ali, who was playing with Karan was also missing and they suspected that the accused might have killed and buried him to conceal the crime.
The suspicion came true when Nishad’s body was also recovered by the villagers on Thursday morning.
The police who reached the spot tried to get the name of MlA’s son removed from the FIR. The angry locals later residents staged a demonstration after which a case was registered but so far no action has been taken to arrest the accused.