Bengaluru: The Karnataka government on Tuesday withdrew cases lodged against 112 people, including BJP leaders,in connection with the riot in 2017 following the death of a youngster, said an official in the know of the development. .
The officer said the decision was taken during the cabinet meeting on Monday and an order on the same was passed on Tuesday.
Speaker Vishweshwar Hegde Kageri is among those whose cases have been withdrawn.
After the body of 18-year-old Paresh Mesta was recovered from a pond “under mysterious circumstances” in Honnavar in Karnataka’s Uttara Kannada district on December 6, 2017, communal riots broke out in the area.
On December 11, 2017, a protest by BJP activists at Kumta in Uttara Kannada turned violent with protesters resorting to stone pelting, burning tyres and setting ablaze buses and the car of an IGP. Over seven people, including police personnel, were injured in the incident.
Then Siddaramaiah-led Congress government lodged cases against Kageri, who was an MLA then, and BJP leaders and Bajrang Dal activists following the communal violence.
In October last year, the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) filed a closure report in connection with the death of 18-year-old, terming it an “accident”.
The CBI said that no evidence was found to prove that Mesta was murdered. The central agency is set to write to the magistrate court in Honnavar informing it that the investigation in the case has concluded. In a letter to Mesta’s family last week, an investigating officer said, “The probe has established that his death was due to an accident”.
“During the investigation, no incriminating evidence has emerged showing the involvement of accused persons and the medico-legal evidence/opinion collected from multiple institutions clearly established the cause of death of Paresh Mesta as anti-mortem drowning. Accordingly, a final report (closure report) is being filed before the jurisdictional court,” read the letter.
The BJP, which was in Opposition in Karnataka at the time, had claimed that it “was a communal murder of a Sangh Parivar worker by a Muslim gang”.
In the days following the murder, BJP’s Udupi-Chikkamagaluru MP Shobha Karandlaje had claimed that “hot oil was poured on his body resulting in the body turning black” and had alleged that the murder was carried out by “jihadi elements”. She also claimed that a “Shivaji tattoo was removed from Mesta’s body by ripping his skin away”.
Responding to the government’s decision, Congress MLA Priyank Kharge said that the false narrative in the case was used by the BJP to incite communal violence for political gain. “A day after the incident, the state government had made a forensic report stating that the death was due to an accident but the BJP MLAs used this accident to create communal violence for their political gains. Now the CBI has said the same thing. Despite this, instead of pulling up their legislators for making such claims, they are removing the cases against them,” he said.
BJP national president JP Nadda however accused Siddaramaiah of conspiring to disturb peace in Karnataka by withdrawing cases against the now-banned Popular Front of India workers “PFI is a banned organisation, they had created fear in the society, and Siddarmaaiah, during his tenure as the CM withdrew 175 cases against PFI and KFD, and their 1,600 activists were released from jail. They wanted to create fear in the society, divide the society, disturb law and order…will you (public) support such people? Do you want such a government?” he asked during a public function in Beluru.