Jansatta men roughed up, fingers point at Jogi aide

Three Jansatta employees, including an assistant manager, were injured in Chhattisgarh when some armed miscreants attacked them, allegedly to stop publication of the newspaper, late on Saturday night. The assailants were reportedly led by a relative of Bal Krishan Aggarwal, a close confident of Chief Minister Ajit Jogi.

Two of the accused, identified as Sanjay Aggarwal — a cousin of Bal Krishan Aggarwal — and Sandeep Soni have been arrested. Bal Krishan, whose printing press had been taken on lease by the Jansatta franchisee Vijay Bhudia for publication of the newspaper’s Raipur edition, was the one who allegedly bribed Prem Bai Mandavi, a zilla parishad chief, last month for securing her entry into the Congress reportedly at Jogi’s behest.

Jogi sought to distance himself from Aggarwal as also Saturday’s attack. ‘‘The CM has no connection with Aggarwal and the Chhattisgarh government unequivocally condemns the attack by anti-social elements,’’ said Director, PR, Shailesh Pathak. Pathak, who visited the Jansatta office today.