LUCKNOW: Three people were arrested late on Monday evening for allegedly shooting a TV journalist Ratan Singh, 45, in Phephna village under Phephna police station area of Ballia district earlier in the day.
Journalists from the entire district put up a huge protest at the national highway number 31 and raised slogans against the district police after the killing.
As per Additional chief secretary, home, Awanish Awasthi, three persons including the main culprit Dinesh Singh were arrested in connection with the incident. The other two persons arrested along with Dinesh Singh were Arvind Singh and Suneel Singh. All three were the neighbours of the slain journalist and the murder was a result of an old land dispute between the two sides.
ADG (law and order) Prashant Kumar said that Ratan had a land dispute with his neighbour, Dinesh Singh. “On Monday, the two had a verbal dual which later took an ugly turn and Dinesh shot Ratan and fled away,” said Kumar. The district police chief was present on the spot and supervising the case, he said.
“Preliminary probe has suggested that the two parties had fought over a piece of land in their village in December 2019. Both the parties had lodged a cross-FIR in the case. On Monday, the victim had placed his haystack which ensued in a verbal spat, following which the opposite party started beating him. To save his life, the scribe ran away from the scene. The miscreants chased and shot at him," said DIG, Azamgarh Range, Subhash Chandra Dubey.
The DIG clarified that the murder was not a result of any story or report covered or shown by the journalist. Meanwhile, Ballia SP Devenra Nath sent Phephna station officer Shashi Mauli Pandey to lines for dereliction of duty.