Three men, who were arrested in connection with the lynching of Rakbar Khan in Rajasthan's Alwar last month, have been charged with murder by the police on Friday.
According to a report in NDTV, the police have filed a 25-page charge sheet naming three men identified as Dharmendra, Paramjeet and Naresh Sharma. However, no cop has been named in the charge sheet.
Khan (28) was allegedly beaten up by cow vigilantes in Alwar district's Ramgarh area on July 20 when he was leading two cows from Ladpura village to his home to Haryana. The police rushed him to a nearby hospital, where he was declared brought dead.
But there were media reports which claimed that Khan was beaten while he was in police custody.
Faced with criticism for allegedly taking three hours to admit Khan to a hospital just 6 km away, Rajasthan Police had earlier admitted that its personnel made an “error in judgement” by delaying taking the victim for treatment.
The incident happened barely a week after the Supreme Court urged Parliament to enact a law against lynching. The top court, taking note of the lynching incident, asked the state government to file its response about the action taken in the case.
Nawal Kishore Meena, SHO, Ramgarh had told Outlook the incident will be given utmost importance and dealt with in accordance with the law.
"What I can tell you now is that an investigation is ongoing. The mob has not been identified yet and are efforts are on to trace them. We'll take our next steps once the victim's post-mortem report comes out," he said.
In a similar incident, 50-year-old Pehlu Khan was beaten to death by cow vigilantes in the same district in April last year.
