In view of the violence reported in Gwalior last Monday, Chief Secretary of Madhya Pradesh Basant Pratap Singh held a meeting of the members of the peace committee on Saturday.
Impressing upon the gathering, the need for peace he said that violence is hurting the interests of the city and sought the support of the public in maintaining peace.
The meeting was attended by SM Afzal, the Additional DG, BM Sharma, the Divisional Commissioner, Vivek Shewalkar, the Mayor, Rahul Jain, the District Collector and Gwalior SP Ashish and others.
Giving a clean chit to the District Collector and the SP in connection with the outbreak of violence on Monday, the CS absolved the officials of any laxity in taking prompt action.
He added that the intelligence agencies had given only a routine warning about the protests and no specific inputs were given.
He emphasized on the point that th e violence was the result of the hostilities between two communities and it was the timely intervention of the administration and the police that saved the situation from getting worse.
In the meantime the relatives of Bobby Tomar, the main accused in the murder of a protestant at Morar met the Chief Secretary and other officials at the Moti Mahal demanding a CBI enquiry into the incident.
They claimed that Bobby Tomar was falsely implicated in the case and that the Morar police have no evidence against him.
They told the CS that they will give `5 lakh if the charges against Bobby are proved correct.
It is learnt from reliable sources that some officers and staff of the Electricity Department took part in the protests on Monday after taking leave on some other pretext. Speaking to the media, Sanjay Goyal, MD, MPEB, Central Zone said that the department is making enquiries about it and strict action will be taken against those who participated in the violent protests.