NEW DELHI: People belonging to Jains community sat on a day-long hunger strike on Monday at Gandhi Samadhi Rajghat to protest against the police firing on a Mahavir Jayanti (April 15) procession in Hyderabad. They wanted an immediate suspension of the officials responsible for The president of the Akhil Bharatiya Jain Samaj Ashok Kumar Jain urged all to participate in a march to Parliament on Thursday.
Their march will start from Birla Mandir at 10 a.m. and end at Patel Chowk. A memorandum will then be presented to Parliament by the leaders.
A commission has been asked to inquire into the incident Jain said it was a mere eye-wash. The terms of reference much to Jain anger states “The incidents led to the Jain community turning violent and consequent opening of fire by the city police.” A retired district judge has been appointed while the community had insisted for a present Supreme Court judge. Jains said the peaceful agitation will continue till all demands are met.
These include an inquiry by Supreme Court judge an transfer of the police official concerned for an impartial probe.
Also he said all charges levee against the Jain community leaders should be with drayman the police stop threatening the families. In the future such incidents should not be repeated he added.
Cutting across party lines several members of parliament ad dressed the Gandhi Smrit gathering. Prominent among them were the minister of state for surface transport. Jagdish Tytler H.B.L. Bhagat Mur Manoha Joshi S.S.Bhandari Ram Avadesh Singh M.Narayanaswami B.L.Sharmi Naresh Pugalia Chandrik Kenia Guman Mal Lodha J.K Jain Dhananjyaj Kumar Jain Madan Lal Khurana M. Viren Shah and Kedar Nar Saami.
They said it was an issue before a society believing in nonviolence not of a particular party or community. Narayanswamy are Ratnakar Pandey criticized the Andhra Pradesh government despite being from the Congress Party.
Article extracted from this publication >> May 8, 1996
