JOIN USSix people were thrashed on the outskirts of Delhi by a mob that suspected them of ferrying cows to a slaughter house on Friday evening.
Trouble began when one of the six trucks carrying buffaloes to a slaughter house in east Delhi grazed a vehicle in Baba Haridas Nagar near Najafgarh on the outskirts of the national capital. Soon locals gathered at the spot and roughed up the truckers, accusing them of ferrying cattle illegally for slaughter.
Police said the mob vandalised six trucks and thrashed the drivers.
The attack comes a week after Prime Minister Narendra Modi warned against cow vigilantism. “Killing of people in the name of ‘gau bhakti’ is not acceptable. This is not something that Mahatma Gandhi would approve of,” Modi had said last week during a visit to Sabarmati Ashram in Ahmedabad. Police said of the six truckers, one, Ali Jaan, had suffered severe injuries and was recuperating at a local hospital.
Five others were discharged after receiving first aid. The mob let loose the buffaloes despite pleas from the truckers that they had valid documents to transport the animals. The police have registered a case against unknown persons for the assault. However, no arrests have been made yet.
As many as 21 incidents of mob lynching in the name of cow protection have been reported from different parts of the country this year.
About a fortnight back, 16-year-old Junaid Khan was beaten to death on a train from Delhi to Mathura following an altercation over seats that snowballed into a fight over religion. Last week, a man was killed in Jharkhand by a mob which accused him of carrying beef in his car.