In a very shocking case reported in the Banaskantha district of Gujarat, a young army man’s wedding procession was the target of ‘another community’ as he rode mare. This happened even after providing police protection to the groom & the baraatis. On Sunday, stones were pelted allegedly by people from another community because the groom chose to ride a mare.
Akash Kumar Koitiya (22) who is an army man in the military police wing had commenced his wedding procession at Sharifda village & at around 11 am a particular group targeted his procession by throwing stones at him & tried to attack him. The jawan had taken a leave for his wedding & was soon going to be posted in Meerut. Recently he had even completed his training at Bengaluru.
Vijay Koitiya (elder brother of Akash) who is also army personnel posted in Jammu and Kashmir said that initially, they had received threats from the Thakor Koli community that if the groom rode a mare, they would not allow the procession to pass through the village. And, as soon as the procession commenced, the same group started pelting stones. The groom then was taken to the Police control room van after escaping injuries. But, three relatives suffered injuries which included two women.
Post the horrific incident; police teams reached the incident site. However, Dalpat Bhatia, a Dalit rights activist from Banaskantha said that the wedding took place without any incident as at least 50-60 were present at the wedding procession as security convoy for making the groom & the baraatis reach safely to the bride’s village, Sundha, in Palanpur taluka.
A total of 11 people belonging to the Thakur Koli community identified as Tushar Koli, Senji Koli, Vinod Koli, Shivaji Koli, Ramaji Koli, Bai Koli, Deepak Koli, Manju Koli, Bhavan Koli, Jeetu Koli & Deepak Ishwar Koli were booked & an FIR was launched by the groom’s family at the Gadh police station in Banaskantha.
Although no arrests have been made as of now, the 11 people have been booked as told by the officer in charge of Gadh police station, P G Rajput. The officer further quoted saying, “The groom and his procession were attacked with stones by a group in the village who objected to him riding a mare. We provided security in advance and after the incident, more personnel were deployed. We have booked 11 accused under Indian Penal Code sections 323 (assault), 337 (causing hurt by rash act) 294 (obscenity), 506 (criminal intimidation) 147 (rioting) and 148 (rioting with deadly weapon) along with sections of the Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe (Prevention of Atrocities Act).”
