NEW DELHI: Police in western India said on Monday that they have arrested 23 people who took part in the weekend lynching of five men suspected of being members of a gang of child kidnappers, as deadly mob attacks fuelled by social media rumours continues around the country.
Police officer M. Ramkumar said five men were bludgeoned to death on Sunday in a remote, mountainous village in Maharashtra state. Villagers pounced on the men when one of them tried to speak to a child at a weekly market, Rajkumar said. “The mob was merciless,” he said.
Rajkumar said police formed five teams to nab the culprits, and had so far arrested 23 of 40 people accused of participating in the mob violence. He said that for days the village had been abuzz with rumours spread through WhatsApp that a gang of child kidnappers was roaming there.
New Delhi Television reported that the five men were from a nomadic community and had gone to a house to ask for food before trying to speak to a child. It also showed a community centre still splashed with blood where the men were locked up before they were brutally killed with sticks, rods and stones, as well as punches.
In a separate incident, police said they rescued five family members, including a two-year-old child, when a mob of thousands attacked them on the suspicion of being child abductors in a town, also in Maharashtra state, early Monday.
Published in Dawn, July 3rd, 2018
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