A 30-year-old man was beaten to death with sticks and rods in Madhya Pradesh’s Shivpuri district in connection with a dispute over a borewell, police said on Wednesday. The incident prompted the Congress to highlight “atrocities” being inflicted on Dalits in the state, even as the BJP stressed that the guilty won’t be spared.
The victim, Narad Jatav, had come to visit his maternal uncle’s home in Indargarh village on Tuesday evening. The attack, allegedly “orchestrated by the village sarpanch and his family, stemmed from a long-standing dispute over a pathway and borewell”, police said.
Around 4 pm, an argument broke out over a borewell pipeline, which Narad reportedly removed, leading to a violent confrontation with the accused. According to the police, sarpanch Padam Dhakad, his brother Mohar Pal Dhakad, son Ankesh Dhakad, and other family members allegedly surrounded Narad and began assaulting him. Witnesses claim the attackers did not stop until Narad succumbed to his injuries.
A purported video of the incident went viral on Wednesday, which shows multiple people repeatedly assaulting Jatav, who pleads with them to stop.
Police reached the scene after receiving reports of the assault and took his body to the district medical college for a post-mortem.
Narad’s family accused the sarpanch and his relatives of premeditated murder, citing a history of disputes with them, police said. The disagreement reportedly began years ago when the sarpanch and Narad’s late uncles co-funded a borewell. While the Jatav family used it to irrigate their land, the Dhakad family reportedly constructed an unauthorised backdoor path through the Jatavs’ land to supply water to their hotel.
This story was originally published in indianexpress.com. Read the full story here.