Over 200 arrested, 102 FIRs lodged in Nuh violence: Haryana minister

CHANDIGARH: Haryana Home Minister Anil Vij on Friday said 202 people have been arrested so far and 80 taken into preventive detention in connection with the communal clashes in Nuh.

He also said the way bullets were fired from hillocks and stones collected on rooftops of buildings indicates that Nuh’s violence was pre-planned.

In all, police have so far filed 102 FIRs in the matter.

“I want to assure you that anyone involved in the violence won’t be spared,” Vij told reporters in Ambala, adding, the detainees are being questioned. It is a big game plan, every person had a lathi in his hand. Were these being distributed for free? Someone must have arranged these. Bullets were being fired. From where did weapons come? We will go to the depth of the matter,” he said.

The minister had earlier on Tuesday too said the violence was engineered and had a mastermind behind it.

However, in a press conference on Friday, the Nuh Superintendent of Police said they have so far found no indication of there being a mastermind behind the clashes.

Nuh SP Narendra Singh Bijarnia said the investigation so far has suggested the involvement of disparate elements, which are being identified and arrested.

Meanwhile, when the minister was asked if the administration will resort to bulldozing the properties of the culprits, he quipped “Bulldozer, wherever necessary, will be used”.

“Ilaj mein bulldozer bhi ek karavayi hai (bulldozer is part of the treatment),” he said.

Haryana authorities have used bulldozers in the past to raze structures of alleged criminals in Nuh and other parts.

On a cybercrime police station being targeted in Nuh, Vij said, “We have taken the incident very seriously.” Investigations are underway to find out who attacked the police station and what records they wanted to destroy, he said.

He said Nuh was becoming a new Jamtara — the Jharkhand district notorious as India’s cyber crime hub.

A massive crackdown was launched earlier this year against cyber criminals and several people were arrested for defrauding people across India.