The Uttar Pradesh Police on Thursday said that seven people have been arrested in Ayodhya for throwing pieces of pork, objectionable posters and torn pages of religious texts outside three mosques and a shrine in an attempt to instigate communal violence.
The police said that the arrested belong to an outfit called the ‘Hindu Yodha Sangathan’, and the leader of the group is a history-sheeter with four criminal cases registered against him.
The police said they have registered four FIRs in connection with the incidents that took place at the Taatshah Jama Masjid, Ghosiyana mosque, a mosque at the Kashmiri Mohalla and a mazar known as Gulab Shah Baba.
“It was an attempt to create communal violence and incite riots in Ayodhya,” police said in a statement.
On Tuesday midnight, the accused threw pieces of pork, letters threatening a particular community and torn pages of a sacred text at the mosques and a mazar, it said.
Eleven people were involved in the conspiracy and four of them are on the run, the police said, adding that they found the accused had purchased skull caps, two copies of the Quran, pork and writing materials.
During the investigation, it was found that the accused were annoyed over the Jahangirpuri incident in Delhi and wanted to take revenge, the statement said.
Those arrested were identified by the police as the outfit’s leader Mahesh Mishra, and Pratyush Kumar, Nitin Kumar, Deepak Gaud, Brajesh Pandey, Shatrughan and Vimal Pandey, all residents of the Kotwali City police station area.
