The police on Monday detained a minor in connection with the killing of 35-year-old dairy farmer Umar Khan, whose dismembered body was found on railway tracks near Govindgarh in Alwar district of Rajasthan on Friday. His family had claimed that he was shot dead by a crowd of cow vigilantes when he was transporting some cows.
Alwar Superintendent of Police Rahul Prakash said the minor boy had named five other attackers and a hunt had been launched for them. The police suspect that the crowd had attacked Umar Khan and two others under the impression that they were smuggling cows.
The post-mortem of Umar Khan’s body was yet to be done, as his relatives insisted that all the culprits be arrested first and the demand for compensation be fulfilled. Umar Khan’s uncle Razaq Khan and others met Director-General of Police Ajit Singh to convey their demands.
Hate crime, say kin
“Though the DGP assured us that justice will be done, we want immediate arrest of the killers. It was a hate crime. The killers threw his body on the tracks to cover up the murder,” Mr. Razaq Khan told The Hindu .
The incident, reported a few months after the lynching of Haryana dairy owner Pehlu Khan by cow vigilantes, also in Alwar, has sparked an outrage.
Home Minister Gulab Chand Kataria said in a statement that strict action would be taken against the culprits. However, he said the State government did not have enough manpower to control “every situation at every place”.
Civil rights activists staged a demonstration at the Gandhi Circle outside Rajasthan University here demanding that the investigation be transferred to an independent agency. They also sought payment of ₹25 lakh and allotment of land as compensation to Umar Khan’s next of kin.
People’s Union for Civil Liberties-Rajasthan president Kavita Srivastava alleged that the policemen of Ramgarh area in Alwar district were complicit in Umar Khan’s murder. “Our suspicion is that the policemen and gau rakshaks tried to destroy evidence by throwing his body on the railway tracks,” she said.
Civil rights groups demanded the arrest of the policemen and dropping of the case of cow smuggling registered against Umar Khan and his fellow travellers, in addition to the formulation of a plan by the State government for protection of Meo Muslims in Alwar and Bharatpur districts.
Umar Khan and two of his acquaintances, Tahir Khan and Javed Khan, were taking some cows in a pick-up truck to their native village, Ghatmika, in Bharatpur after purchasing them in Alwar on Friday. They were allegedly waylaid at Fahari, where they were assaulted and shot at, leading to Umar Khan’s death.
