Seeking justice for Zafar Khan, activists begin sit-in near Assembly, demand arrest of accused

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IndiaTomorrow.net,
Jaipur, June 19: Demanding immediate arrest of the Pratapgarh municipality employees made accused in the FIR for the death of social activist and CPI-ML leader Zafar Khan, a number of civil and human rights activists began a five-day protest sit-in near the state Assembly here on Monday.

They wrote an open letter to Rajasthan Chief Minister Vasundhara Raje and demanded Rs one crore as compensation to the family of Zafar Khan who was allegedly beaten to death by some staffers of the Pratapgarh municipality Friday morning when he objected to them taking pictures of women defecating in the open.

Pratapgarh district chief of CPI-ML, Khan, 55, would run a kirana shop to run his family – wife and 14-year-old daughter.

The activists also demanded the woman Chief Minister “to review the policy of naming and shaming as part of the Swachh Bharat Abhiyan, which only lowers the dignity of people and legitimises sexual violence.”

In the letter, the listed several incidents of lynching and mob violence in the state and demanded the government to check it.

“This incident of lynching to death is a part of a whole series that started with Dangawaas, Nagaur on the 14th of May, 2015, when 6 dalits were brutally attacked and killed by the dominant caste people over a land dispute…On 30th May, 2015 Abdul Ghaffar Qureshi of Birloka village, Khimsar, Nagaur was killed by a crowd of Gau Goondas…In June 2016, in Pratapgarh, more than 150 people, who were members of the Bajrang Dal and so called Gau Rakshaks stopped several trucks carrying draught animals, mainly bullocks and accused the truck drivers of cow smuggling and not only beat up the drivers but also stripped them naked and took away all the animals…On 3rd October of 2016, Gavroo Banjara and his family after legally buying 6 bullocks from the Kunwariya Animal Fair, were returning to their village Bhamakhera in Relmagra tehsil, when they were stopped by 17 of these Gau goondas, who demanded money, when they refused they were brutally assaulted and their truck carrying bullocks was taken away…On the 19th of March, 2017 Sadhvi Kamal Didi of the Rashtriya Mahila Gau Rakshak Samiti alleged that the staff of Hotel Hyatt Rabbani in Bani Park area of Jaipur fed beef to Gaumata and gathered a few hundred people, beat up the cleaner, the receptionist in front of the police and when the Hotel owner Mr.Naeem Rabbani refused to come to the hotel, she got the Jaipur city mayor to seal the hotel after throwing out more than 20 occupants late in the night…”

“On the 1st of April, 2017 Pehlu Khan of Jaisinghpur Nuh Haryana, his two sons and two others from the village had bought 5 cows and six calves from the Ramgarh Hatwara outside Jaipur. After collecting the receipts from Jaipur Municipal Corporation counter, they loaded the trucks with the cows and calves and took the NH8 Highway for Nuh. At Behror, 120 kms from Jaipur on the NH8, they were stopped by these Gau Goondas who pulled them out of their vehicle and chased them and beat them up brutally that Pehlu Khan succumbed to his injuries and died on the 3rd of April,” they wrote.

Meanwhile, CPI-ML national leader Dipankar Bhattacharya visited Khan’s home in Pratapgarh town and met his family members.

“#JusticeForZafar means an end to #LynchMobRaj. #JusticeForZafar means an end to humiliation in the name of #SwachhBharat,” tweeted Dipankar.

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