Gujarat: Dalit couple attacked, thrashed by over 200 Upper caste men over Facebook post in Vadodara; case filed

In a shocking incident, a Dalit couple was allegedly attacked by a mob of 200-300 upper caste people. The incident took place in Mahuvad village in Padra taluka of Vadodara on Monday, after the husband allegedly posted on Facebook that government does not allow the village temple to be used for Dalit wedding ceremonies. The police have filed the case against the 11 person and the mob while the victim who posted on Facebook was also charged for allegedly promoting enmity between different groups.

The incident came to light on Thursday when the Dalit women identified as Tarulataben Mackwana filed an FIR against the 11 people and mob of 200-300 people at Vadu police station for attacking her house, thrashing her husband, pelting stones and threatening them over his Facebook post.

Tarulataben in her complaint stated that the mob was armed with pipes, sticks and other weapons, arrived at her house and shouted abusive words at the couple. They also allegedly slapped her when she stepped out of her house to confront them and then barged into the house and dragged her husband Pravin out of the house and allegedly beaten her. In her statement she also stated that the men threatened her husband to delete the post otherwise the couple had to face the consequences.

Though the incident took place on Monday but the victim filed the complaint on Thursday after a failed attempt to arrive at a compromise by both the communities.

The 11 people named in the FIR are Chaitanyasinh Jhala, Dilip Parmar, Mayursinh Jhala, Dilipsinh Rajput, Mahesh Jadav, Kishan Parmar, Sanjaysinh Parmar, Arjun Parmar, Arvind Parmar, Naresh Parmar and Ajay Parmar, all residents of Mahuvad.

The police have booked the accused under Sections 143 (member of an unlawful assembly), 147 (Punishment for rioting), 149 (Every member of unlawful assembly guilty of offence committed in prosecution of common object), 452 (House-trespass after preparation for hurt, assault or wrongful restraint), 336 (Act endangering life or personal safety of others), 323 (Punishment for voluntarily causing hurt), 504 (Intentional insult with intent to provoke breach of the peace), 506 (2) (Punishment for criminal intimidation) and under relevant sections of the SC/ST Prevention of the Atrocities Act of IPC.

No arrests have been made so far, after filing the complaint a 24-hour patrolling team was immediately deployed to the village. “We are recording the statements of the villagers and the eyewitnesses in the case. We are yet to arrest anybody named in the FIR,” the investigating officer in the case, Deputy Superintendent of Police, Vadodara Rural, Ravindra Patel said.

Also, the police is verifying the facts claimed by the victim Pravin that whether such practice of not renting temple to Dalits is true or not. “So far, no one has spoken about it in the affirmative,” said Patel. “For now we have deployed police patrol teams there to avoid any further clash or violence.”

Meanwhile, on Thursday hours after the complaint was filed, Secretary-General of Rajput Shakti Yuva Sangathan’s Padra unit Kiran Padhiyar filed the complained against the victim Pravin over the post. In his complaint he alleged that Pravin tried to cause tension and enmity between the communities through his post. In his complaint he also states that the post that was posted on 14th May read, “Your democratic BJP government doesn’t let the premise of Ranchodji temple in Mahuvad village of Padra taluka of Vadodara be rented out to the Dalit community for wedding ceremonies,” following this in the comment section people abused the Rajput community, Padhiyar alleged.

Following this, police has booked Pravin Mackwana under sections 153 1 (a) and (b) (Promoting enmity between different groups on grounds of religion, race, place of birth, residence, language), 294 (Obscene acts and songs) and 406 (Punishment for criminal breach of trust) of IPC.

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