Bihar: Chhapra tense after youth killed, two seriously injured in post Lok Sabha poll clashes

Tension simmers in Chhapra town, district headquarter of Saran in Bihar, after one person was killed and another two received grave injuries following a serious altercation between two groups in the Telpa area on Tuesday morning, May 21.

The deceased has been identified as Chandan Kumar Yadav , while the other two injured persons have been identified as Manoj Rai and Guddu Rai, all residents of Chhapra. Both the injured persons are being treated at the Patna Medical College Hospital (PMCH) and they are reported to be out of danger.

According to the information shared by the district police, the skirmish that occurred on Tuesday morning is possibly linked with the row that erupted at booth no. 318,319 on Monday evening, where a heated exchange and stone pelting were reported between the workers of Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD).

As of now, the district police have apprehended two suspects identified as Ramakant Singh and Ravikant Singh, alias Rampratap Singh, both residents of Telpa Basti, within town police station limits. The police team has also recovered arms and cartridges from the possession of the accused.

Further, internet services have also been suspended in the district for two days, while heavy deployments of security personnel have been made in view of preventing any untoward incidents. Flag marches are also being conducted by the paramilitary forces in the region, according to Saran police in a press release issued on Tuesday evening.

Reacting to the incident, RJD candidate, Rohini Acharya said that these people (the BJP) are scared, democracy is being murdered, we want justice, and three of our workers have been shot. These are the BJP’s goons, we demand the filing of an FIR against them and the immediate arrest of these goons.

Acharya further alleged that she was misbehaving when she visited one of the booths as a candidate. ‘As a candidate, I have the right to go to every booth, however, when I questioned the presence of a BJP worker who had already cast his vote, I was misbehaved and abused. They were armed with sticks and stones, and now they have killed one of my party workers in the morning’, said Acharya.

Meanwhile, the BJP candidate from the Saran constituency, Rajiv Pratap Rudy, said that Chhapra is once again passing through a phase of violence. We already witnessed incidents of violence by RJD’s workers at a number of polling booths yesterday. It all started yesterday. When a candidate enters a booth, it falls under the violation of moral code of conduct. The BJP party workers protested against this which resulted in a heated exchange and stone pelting between the workers of both the parties.

The former union minister further claimed that one of the persons identified as Mohan Singh was assaulted in the morning by the RJD workers,, which enraged the villagers who soon gathered at the spot leading to further clashes and the firing incident.

Meanwhile, in a briefing about the incident, District Magistrate (DM), Saran, Aman Samir, said that, “There was an atmosphere of tension that occurred yesterday between two parties after a candidate came near polling station 318-319. After the tension arouse our patrolling team was deputed. This morning a scuffle broke out between the supporters of both BJP and RJD in which one person has been died and two others are injured.

“Two persons have been apprehended, and other accused are being identified, action will be taken against them. As a precautionary measure, we have suspended internet services for two days while adequate deployments of security personnel have also been made. There was no prior enmity reported between the groups, and yesterday’s incident was possibly the trigger point of the scuffle, the situation is under control  now,” added DM Samir.

It is to be noted that the high profile Saran Lok Sabha constituency underwent polls on May 20 in the fifth phase of the ongoing Lok Sabha polls, where BJP’s heavyweight Rajiv Pratap Rudy was in the fray with Rohini Acharya, daughter of RJD supremo Lalu Yadav.

It is worth mentioning here that the Saran constituency is considered a traditional stronghold for the RJD, where the BJP has managed to turn a large chunk of voters in their favour in the last decade. The constituency was previously represented by Lalu Prasad Yadav himself, who defeated Rajiv Pratap Rudy in the Lok Sabha polls 2009.

However, the former union minister Rudy made a grand comeback in the 2014 election when he defeated the RJD candidate Rabri Devi. The BJP stalwart in the year 2019 retained his seat by defeating the RJD candidate Chandrika Rai by a margin of around 1.38 lakh votes.