Lucknow: A Samajwadi Party leader and his son were shot dead in broad daylight in Uttar Pradesh’s Sambhal district on Tuesday following an altercation over a road built under the MNREGA scheme.
A viral video of the murder showed two men armed with rifles threatening SP leader Chhotelal Diwakar and his son Sunil, following which they shot dead the father-son duo. The video was recorded by one of the villagers present at the scene in Fatehpur Shamsoi village under Bahjoi police station in Sambhal.
One of the armed men in the video was identified as Savinder, a local strongman. Local sources said Diwakar and his son had gone to inspect the road which cut through a field in the village.
IG Ramit Sharma and SP Yamuna Prasad reached the spot and conducted investigations. An FIR was registered after a written complaint by Diwakar’s wife.
“Five people have been detained in connection with the incident. Six teams have been constituted and soon other culprits will be nabbed,” said Yamuna Prasad.
News agency IANS reported that the assailants had arrived on a motorbike but fled the scene on foot, abandoning their two-wheeler.
Chhotelal Diwakar had contested the 2017 assembly elections on a Samajwadi Party ticket.
In a scathing reaction, the Samajwadi Party said the Yogi Adityanath government had failed on the “law and order front”.
“The law and order situation in UP is in its worst state. Samajwadi Party leader Chhotelal Diwakar and his son were shot dead in broad daylight. The government has failed on the law and order front badly. I demand the immediate arrest of those involved. Also, Rs 20 lakh ex-gratia should be given to the kin of the deceased,” SP leader Ram Govind Chaudhary said.
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