E-Paper
9 Indore civic body employees booked for disrespecting Ganesh idols: Madhya Pradesh police
Indore civic body chief Prathiba Pal terminated all nine employees, including two supervisors -- Avinash Deshmukh and Chandra Shekhar Yadav -- from the services
Bhopal: Nine contractual employees of Indore Municipal Corporation (IMC) were booked on Tuesday for allegedly disrespecting Ganesh idols collected from people by throwing them into a pond for immersion, Madhya Pradesh police said.
IMC commissioner Prathiba Pal terminated all nine employees, including two supervisors -- Avinash Deshmukh and Chandra Shekhar Yadav -- from the services. The programme officer Shailendra Pataudi and zonal officer Brijmohan Bhadoriya were also suspended. An inquiry has also been ordered in this regard, Pal said.
“The incident of throwing idols in a pond has hurt the religious sentiments of people,” Pal said.
Based on a complaint lodged by an employee of the IMC, an FIR under section 295A (deliberate and malicious acts, intended to outrage religious feelings of any class by insulting its religion or religious beliefs) was registered against nine civic employees, an official from Chandan Nagar police station said.
The video of the incident has gone viral on social media, in which IMC employees can be seen throwing the Ganesh idols in a hurried manner, even as enraged citizens were heard saying that their religious sentiments were being hurt and strongly criticising the civic administration.
Congress MLA Sanjay Shukla with other party leaders staged a protest in Indore demanding action against senior officers.
Shukla said, “It was the responsibility of senior officers of IMC to hold the immersion of idols collected from different parts of the city but they deputed the work to contractual employees. The action and FIR on contractual employees are not enough. The state government should take strict against IMC officers for hurting the religious sentiments.”
BJP leaders said it is a serious issue and all the people at fault will be punished. BJP MP from Indore, Shankar Lalwani, said, “The conduct of employees is unacceptable and they have already been punished for that. An FIR has been registered against them. The inquiry is being held by IMC and further action will be taken on the basis of findings of reports.”
(With inputs from Neha Jain in Indore)
