5 Dalits beaten up over beef 'possession'

Five Dalit youths of a family were beaten, stripped and tied to a vehicle for possessing beef in Una town of Gir Somnath district in Saurashtra.

The five were dragged for almost a kilometre by some cow protection vigilantes before being handed over to the police. A video of the incident, reportedly shot by one of the perpetrators, went viral on social media, forcing the local authorities to initiate action against the culprits.

“The police has started investigating the incident,” Nitin Patel, senior minister and government spokesperson, told mediapersons in Gandhinagar on Wednesday. According to sources, six men and a woman from a family of Mota Samadhiyala village near Una were shearing a dead cattle.

The youths, involved in manufacturing of leather, were cornered by a group of six men, who stripped and beat them in public. The men also appeared brazen in giving the punishment and continued to beat the five youths for over half an hour with rods, before dragging them to the police station, a kilometre away.

It was only when people from the dalit community gathered at the police station did the police register an FIR against the six men.