By Sanika Athavale
On the night of November 11, Mohammad Jamal, a cattle trader in Bihar, was lynched by four men while he was on his way to sell cows about 30 kilometers from Katihar in eastern Bihar, The Quint reported.
Jamal was declared dead on arrival at a local government hospital.
It was confirmed that Jamal was with two members of his family when he had went out to sell cows. He was followed and stopped by four men at Labha enroute to West Bengal.
Sagar Yadav, a local rogue, and three members of his family asked Jamal and his group to pay money for using the road for cattle transport. When he refused, he was thrashed by the goons while his cousin and uncle managed to escape.
Jamal’s body came home the next morning causing an uproar in the neighborhood. Local administrative officials had to intervene to dismiss the angry crowd around his house.
One of the officers told The Quint that on the 13th of November that none of the accused had been arrested and a search was on. “An FIR under section 302 (punishment for murder), 384 (extortion) and 34 (common intention) of the IPC has been registered at Roushna op police station,” he said.
India is one of the top beef exporting countries of the world but ironically has seen an upsurge in violent ‘cow vigilantism’ since 2014. Bihar has shown a scary rise in its mob lynching trends, as in July alone, 12 such incidents were reported in 15 days.
The worrying numbers even pushed Bihar CM Nitish Kumar to announce that people found guilty of the charge would be disqualified for government jobs. However, on the 3rd of October, an advocate from Bihar lodged an FIR against 50 Indian artists who wrote to the Prime Minister about the alarming case of mob-lynchings in the country.
This story was first appeared on thelogicalindian.com