During today’s Lakhimpur violence, a court rejected discharge pleas and framed charges against Ashish Mishra, others
In a case involving the death of four farmers and a journalist when a convoy of SUVs ran over them in Tikonia on October 3, 2021, a Lakhimpur Kheri court rejected Ashish Mishra’s discharge application, who’s the son of Union Minister Ajay Mishra. The 13 accused are all in jail.
There were 14 accused… 13 filed discharge applications in court, claiming they were wrongly booked. Sunil Kumar Verma, Additional District and Sessions Judge, rejected all the discharge applications on Monday,” said Arvind Tripathi, lawyer for Lakhimpur Kheri district government.
A court date has been set for December 6 (Tuesday) for charging the accused. The trial will start as soon as the charges against the accused are framed. IPC Section 34 (acts done by multiple people in furtherance of a common intention) was removed from the charge sheet on Monday. As IPC Section 149 (every unlawful assembly member guilty of an offence committed in furtherance of a common purpose) is already there, Section 34 isn’t needed,” said Tripathi.
Four people have also been charged with murder in the violence that followed the deaths of four farmers and a journalist on Monday.
In Lakhimpur Kheri, a convoy of three SUVs, including a Mahindra Thar belonging to Ashish Mishra’s dad Ajay Mishra, allegedly ran over a group of protesting farmers. A journalist and four farmers were killed. Two BJP workers and the driver of the Thar vehicle were killed in the violence that followed.
As part of its investigation, a Special Investigation Team (SIT) filed charges against 14 people, including Ashish Mishra and his uncle Virendra Kumar Shukla. Among the accused is Lucknow native Ankit Das, nephew of former Rajya Sabha member Akhilesh Das.
Except for Shukla, the charge sheet against remaining 13 was filed under IPC sections 147 (rioting), 148 (rioting, armed with deadly weapon), 149 (every member of unlawful assembly guilty of offence committed in prosecution of common object), 302 (murder), 307 (attempt to murder), 326 (voluntarily causing grievous hurt by dangerous weapons or means), 34 (acts done by several persons in furtherance of common intention), 427 (mischief causing damage to the amount of fifty rupees) and 120-B (criminal conspiracy). They were also indicted under different sections of the Arms Act.
Other 11 accused individuals are Nandan Das Bhist, Satyam Tripathi alias Satya Prakash Tripathi, Lateef alias Kalley, Shekhar Bharti, Sumit Jaiswal, Ashish Pandey, Luvkush, Shishupal, Ullas Kumar Trivedi alias Mohit Trivedi, Rinku Rana and Dharmendra Kumar Banjara, along with Ashish Mishra, Shukla and Das.
The police have filed a charge sheet against Shukla under section 201 of the Indian Penal Code (causing the disappearance of evidence of the offence or providing information to screen the offender). Shukla has been released from prison.
As a result of the deaths of two BJP workers and a driver, the SIT filed charges against four people in January. These are the four accused: Vichitra Singh, Gurpreet Singh, Gurvinder Singh, and Kamaljeet Singh. This case has all the accused in jail.
In this case, IPC sections 147 (rioting), 149 (punishment of abetment if the act abeted occurs in consequence and is not expressly punished), 114 (abettor present when the crime is committed), 325 (voluntarily causing grievous harm), 302 (murder), 427 (mischief by fire or explosive substance with intent to destroy house, etc) and 504 (intentional insult to provoke a breach of peace).
Ashish Mishra had been granted bail by the Lucknow bench of Allahabad High Court in February, but the Supreme Court set it aside.
