UP mob violence: Cop attacked with stones, axe, dragged before he was shot dead

Police officer Subodh Kumar Singh who was killed by a mob following cow slaughter in Bulandshahr, Uttar Pradesh, earlier this month, was attacked with stones, sticks, an axe before he was shot dead with his licenced revolver, police said. The miscreants also attempted to set his jeep on fire, they added.

Apparently, these chilling details about the brutality preceding inspector Subodh Kumar Singh’s death have emerged following the arrest of the main accused who the police claim had pulled the trigger.

Till about six months ago, Prashant Natt, the prime accused in the case, drove an Ola cab in Delhi. He was arrested from his in-laws’ home in Greater Noida on Thursday. According to the UP police, Prashant Natt has confessed to shooting Subodh Singh.

Reportedly, Subodh Kumar Singh was attacked by a mob when he and his team had gone to a village to defuse tension after cow carcasses were found in a forest. Thereafter, the protests escalated after activists of right-wing group Bajrang Dal came to the area and blocked a road with a truck carrying the dead cows.

Further, the officer was first hit with a rock by a mob of around 400 people. Since December 3, Bajrang Dal activist Yogesh Raj, and another man called Kalua, who had instigated the mob, have been missing, according to the police.

Subodh Singh was trying to handle the mob when Kalua reportedly attacked him with an axe. The barbarians, first chopped off his fingers, before he was struck in the head. The brutality didn’t end there, the officer tried to escape but the accused men caught hold of him and dragged him to the fields, where Prashant Natt took out Subodh Kumar Singh service revolver and shot him, police said.

The men kept on hitting him with sticks as if they were on some vengeance, as his fellow officers tried to rescue him. In a bid to save his life, the officers then put him in the jeep to take him to the hospital, but the mob started throwing stones on the vehicle forcing the cops to disperse to save their lives, an officer said.

Police present during the incident said that the mob then tried to set the vehicle on fire, but the cops returned and brought Subodh Kumar out of the jeep. As per the postmortem report, he was shot at point-blank range above left eyebrow, and he had several fractures in his hand and legs.

in the FIR or first information report, the police have named 27 people. Over 20 of them named in the FIR, including an Army man, have been arrested. Prashant Natt, the main accused, was not named in the FIR.

“Prashant Natt had always been the main accused. He along with his wife and children went missing after the incident. We kept it under wraps as we didn’t want to alert him. His role became clear after the special investigation team (SIT) analysed the video footage, collected evidence, spoke to eyewitnesses and those who have been arrested,” said rabhakar Chaudhary, Senior Superintendent of Police, Bulandshahr told NDTV.

However, Natt’s brother, claims that he is being made a scapegoat by the police. He said, “The police haven’t been able to arrest the mastermind so they have arrested my brother.”

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