Clashes during Moharram processions in UP

Clashes during Moharram processions in Uttar Pradesh on Friday left scores, including cops, injured.

According to sources, the security personnel had to resort to lathi charge and use tear gas shells to disperse the violent mobs at several places in the state.

Two cops were assaulted in Gorakhpur district, when a mob attacked a police outpost after their 'tazia' (a replica of the tomb of Imam Hussain, the martyred grand son of Prophet Muhammad) accidentally came in contact with a live wire leaving a few youths injured.

The mob set ablaze a police vehicle also, sources said.

The police had to then resort to lathi charge and fire tear gas shells to disperse the mob. The mob indulged in heavy stone pelting and others in the vicinity had to scurry for cover, sources added.

Some people have been detained in connection with the violence, the police said.

Police also made a lathi charge, when the youths, who were part of a Moharram procession, blocked traffic at Ghanta Ghar area in Meerut town, about 500 kilometres from here over purported denial of permission to take out the procession from a communally sensitive locality.

Clashes were also reported from Pilibhit district during the Moharram procession, sources said.

Elaborate security arrangements had been made by the administration in the state capital on this occasion. Moharram processions were taken out in different parts of the state capital and elsewhere on Friday. No untoward incidents were reported from anywhere in the city, which has a history of sectarian violence during Moharram.