The Morbi Police registered an FIR against 21 persons and unknown others on a host of charges including unlawful assembly and criminal conspiracy on Friday (September 18), the day after effigies of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah were burnt in Jetpar village on the Prime Minister’s birthday.
Jetpar, in Morbi district, has been roiled by an agitation of farmers for several months. The farmers have been protesting against the installation of high-tension electricity transmission lines across their farms by Halvad Transmission Limited, a special purpose vehicle of Adani Energy Solutions Ltd (AESL).
The FIR was registered on Friday evening on the basis of a complaint by Inspector Nilesh S Ghetiya of Morbi Taluka police station on behalf of the State.
Inspector Ghetiya said that he was out patrolling on September 17 night when he received a video of the effigies of Modi and Shah being burnt. He stated that he had learned that the alleged incident had taken place in Jetpar village.
September 17, the day Prime Minister Modi turned 76, saw celebrations by the BJP around the country. Special prayers were said in Varanasi, his constituency, and in Vadnagar, where Modi was born in 1950, Home Minister Shah made a speech describing him as a “lotus in the middle of a swamp”.
In his complaint, Ghetiya said: “Since this village (Jetpar) is in my jurisdiction, I investigated and found that since it was the birthday of PM Narendra Modi, the residents of Jetpar village had raised slogans and burnt their (the PM’s and Shah’s) effigies to protest the same.”
According to the FIR, 21 named accused and unknown others had “set up an illegal dome in the main crossroads of Jetpar village, in such a way that it hampered transport of essential services and goods, entered into a criminal conspiracy, and without any permissions from the administration, had formed an unlawful assembly and had violated notifications issued by the competent authority. They had also poured inflammable liquid on effigies and set fire to them, creating an atmosphere of fear, hit the effigies of the Prime Minister and Home Minister with washing paddles and raised insulting slogans against them”.
Story continues below this ad
Protesters, mainly Patidar farmers, had led a hunger strike for almost two weeks from June 17 onward, demanding higher compensation for their land, which they said would become agriculturally unusable once the transmission towers came up.
Protests had been ongoing since June 9 at several places across the state, but they had been concentrated in Morbi, which the farmers said would be the “worst affected”. Among the fasting protesters at the Upwaas Chhavni in Jetpar were 57-year-old Rakeshbhai Shivlal Amrutiya and 51-year-old Bharatbhai Amrutiya, brothers of Kantilal Amrutiya, the multi-term BJP MLA from Morbi and Minister of State for Labour, Skill Development and Employment in the Gujarat government.
On July 3, the government had agreed to several of the protesters’ demands, but had failed to satisfy the farmers, who had said they would continue with their “satyagraha”.
The FIR registered on Friday has named Nehul Dhirajlal Amrutiya, Harshad Chatur Aghara, Raju Bhudar Kandiya, Deepak Natha Zakasaniya, Lalji Ghanshyam Zakasaniya, Lalit alias Bhotiyo Cheeku Aghara, Koka Bachu Kandiya, Amit Bachu Kandiya, Naresh Bachu Aghara, Nandlal Prabhu Amrutiya, Govind Dharamshi Amrutiya, Chatur Chauhan Aghara, Labhu Amarshi Varasada, Hiren Chandu Aghara, Vipul Magan Kandiya, Khushangi Rajesh Aghara, Darshana Harshad Aghara, Mittal Vipul Kandiya, Jyoti Niket Panchasar, Nirubha Pramodsinh Jadeja, Heerji Devji Detroja, and others.
Story continues below this ad
Nehul Dhirajlal Amrutiya, named in the FIR, was one of the prominent leaders of the agitation in June-July, and had to be admitted to a hospital after his health deteriorated due to the protest fast.
Inspector Ghetiya told The Indian Express that police would issue notices to all the accused soon.
