PATNA: Even as a journalist from Rajasthan arrested by Bihar police under the SC-ST Act and lodged in a Patna jail was granted bail on Friday, a high-level probe began by Bihar police into allegations that it was a wrongful arrest conducted out of hidden political motivation.
Durg Singh Rajpurohit, who works with a television channel at Barmer in Rajasthan, was granted bail by Patna special court (SC-ST) in-charge judge Manoj Kumar Sinha on two personal bonds of Rs 5,000 each. The bail came two days after Rajpurohit, who was brought to Patna on Monday following his arrest at Barmer the day before, was sent to judicial custody for 14 days.
With Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar having ordered a probe into allegations that he arrest was wrongful and politically motivated, inspector general (Patna zone) Naiyar Hasnain Khan said on Friday that he had started gathering details of the case as part of the investigations.
Police sources said Rajpurohit was arrested on the basis of a warrant issued against him by the SC-ST special court on August 16. The warrant pertained to a complaint filed in the court on May 31 under the Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe (Prevent-ion of Atrocities) Act.
The complainant, Rakesh Paswan, a resident of Tetua village under Digha police station in Patna district, had alleged that he had been working at a stone quarry owned by Rajpurohit in Rajasthan and that the latter did not pay him regularly and beat him up. Paswan also complained that when he fled and returned home, Rajpurohit visited his house on May 7, assaulted him and abused him using caste slurs.
Intriguingly, Paswan’s father, Dashrath Paswan, has told journalists that his son never went to Rajasthan and that he had also never lodged any complaint against any person in a court. “My son has been missing ever since this case came to light. I am worried about his safety and want him back home,” he said.
Rajpurohit’s father, Guman Singh, has claimed that he never visited Bihar and that he does not own any stone or sand quarry as he has been a professional journalist for the past 18 years.