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Conservationist assaulted by group in K’taka distt, 1 arrested: police
The incident came to light after a video, captured by a school teacher, surfaced on social media on Wednesday. In the video, eight persons were seen waylaying a gypsy driven by Girish, pulling out the passengers and assaulting and abusing them in the middle of the road just outside a government school in Shantaveri village in the district.
A noted environmentalist and his co-passengers were allegedly assaulted brutally by a group of inebriated men in Karnataka’s Chikkamagaluru district, about 245 kms from Bengaluru, on Monday. The incident took place after the environmentalist DV Girish tried to object to lewd and obscene comments passed by the perpetrators, police said.
The incident came to light after a video, captured by a school teacher, surfaced on social media on Wednesday. In the video, eight persons were seen waylaying a gypsy driven by Girish, pulling out the passengers and assaulting and abusing them in the middle of the road just outside a government school in Shantaveri village in the district. Chikkamagaluru rural police station officials said that an FIR was filed on Tuesday on charges of assault and criminal intimidation of the IPC. Police have also arrested one of the miscreants, identified as Aruna, on Tuesday.
Girish on Wednesday said that he was travelling back from a friend’s estate in Kemmangundi to Chikmagaluru when they encountered the miscreants. He said that some youngsters, who were visibly inebriated passed lewd comments on a friend’s 17-year old daughter, seated inside the vehicle.
“I just used the brakes but didn’t stop and asked them why they were saying such things (lewd remarks),” Girish said.
However, Girsh was persuaded by a local taxi driver not to engage with the miscreants and carry on. “Since she girl was there, we did not engage with them and went off. After another 2 kms, I saw these bikes chasing us in my rear-view mirror,” Girish said. But a few kilometers later, the perpetrators overtook the vehicle and waylaid Girish and his friends, pulled them out of them, assaulted and abused them. Girish said the miscreants fled when they got the whiff that the police had been informed.
