An FIR has been filed against a Sri Rama Sene member in Chikmaglur district, for allegedly threatening and assaulting a journalist with a Kannada weekly.
Madhusudan, a Sri Rama Sene member, allegedly assaulted Riyaz Kachgal, a journalist with Agni weekly in Koppa, Chikmaglur district.
According to Riyaz, trouble has been brewing since October, when he wrote a story about the alleged nexus between Mahesh Kattinamane and a man named Shridhar Shetty, who is a rowdy-sheeter. Titled “Chor guru, bucket shishya” the story published on October 21 had alleged that the pair was running an extortion racket.
Riyaz alleged that Mahesh had threatened him even after this, but that he did not give it much thought.
In December 17, Riyaz had alleged in a story that a BJP MLA in Chikmaglur had brought about the cancellation of an event to celebrate Kannada literary giants Kuvempu and Poornachandra Tejaswi.
Riyaz said that once again he was threatened but he ignored it. On December 26, he said that Madhusudan and Mahesh Kattinamane, another Rama Sene member, had gone to his village, looking for his family.
“People called me up and told me that two men were looking for my family and that they said that they would thrash my parents. I feared for my parents when I head this. It’s only natural. I can take anything they throw my way, but I don’t want anything to happen to my parents,” Riyaz said, adding that he went to the police station that day to file a complaint against the pair. He alleges that the police did not take him seriously and that then too they filed an NCR.
On January 27, he was assaulted at a canteen in Jogisara area of Balagudi. He had gone to meet a man he knew.
“Suddenly, Mahesh came and assaulted me. He banged my head against the wall. I saw two more men and I think they had a club with them. As soon as he released me, I escaped,” he said, adding that it was then that he went to the police again.
Chikmaglur SP Santhosh Babu told The News Minute that and NCR had been registered initially, but the FIR had been registered on the same day within an hour.
Asked how the police could get permission from the court in an hour, Babu said: “We do (get permission in such a short span of time).”
Asked why an NCR was registered and not an FIR, Babu said: “Both of them were sitting in a room and this man (Madhusudan) slapped him. Slapping is a non-cognizable offence and so we registered an NCR.”