Man dies in police fire

Sarlahi, June 30

Deban Mahato, 27, died in police fire while protesting in Banke Jungle section of the East-West Highway.

Mahato who was an inhabitant of Iswarpur – 13, Gaurishankar of Sarlahi District had died on the spot as he was shot on the head.

Local people had organised protests by obstructing the highway following 12 years old Amit Ray’s death by drowning in a pit in the Banke River that flows at the border of Sarlahi and Mahottari district. The pit was dug to extract sand.

They had kept the dead body of the child in the road and obstructed the vehicular movement.

The protesting locals had demanded stopping the haphazard extraction of the river materials, filling the old pits, providing compensation to the family of the deceased child, and shutting down the crusher plants at the river bank.

Another youth has also been injured in the police fire and 13 police and armed police personnel are injured from the stones pelted to them by the protestors. The injured security personnel are getting treatment at the hospitals in Harioun and Lalbandi.

Police had shot 14 shell tear gas and 2-dozen fire in the air. Spokesperson of the Sarlahi police Pratit Singh Rathore said that the police responded with fire after the protestors attacked the security personnel while the latter were trying to open the obstructed road.

Published in The Rising Nepal daily on 1 July 2019.