‘Attack was mob fury, not racist’
‘Attack was mob fury, not racist’
Karnataka home minister G. Parameshwar has strongly refuted the claim that the mob fury directed at the 21-year-old Tanzanian student was racist, saying it was a spillover of the people’s anger over a local woman being run over by a car driven by an inebriated Sudanese.
“This is definitely not a racial attack. This is just a response to an accident caused by a Sudanese student. I do not think Bengalureans have got that kind of a mindset,” Dr G. Parameshwar told reporters on Thursd ay, counselling foreign students to abide by the law and not drink and drive.
Taking cognisance of the report on the battering that the Tanzanian student received at the hands of an angry mob, Dr Parameshwar said he will take the investigation to its logical conclusion even as the city police were asked to submit a report on the shocking incident which was condemned across the world and brought shame to a city that prides its cosmopolitanism.
Dr Parameshwar insisted it was a case of road rage and mob fury and not racism, despite Bosco Kaweesi, the lawyer for the African students in the city, saying the victim, Linah, a student of architecture at a local college, had been roundly abused and her clothes ripped off by a mob that rained racial abuse on her.
The police have arrested five suspects, who were part of the mob, and said some more arrests were likely to follow. IG-DGP Om Prakash and city police commissioner N.S. Megharikh on Thursday morning visited the Hesaraghatta suburb where the Tanzanian victims and other African students live and reassured them of their safety in the city.
The two cases — road accident and arson and rioting — registered at Soladevanahalli police station in Hesaraghatta have been transferred to the CCB to investigate under the supervision of ACP (West) Charan Reddy, who will submit a report to the state government within 48 hours.
The state government has communicated to the ministry of external affairs in New Delhi the developments in the case, Dr G. Parameshwar told reporters, reiterating, “If we find any lapses on the part of any officials in the police department, we will definitely take severe action, including suspension, once the report is submitted to us.”
The Congress government has been asked by Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi to submit a report.
