Bettiah: A photojournalist belonging to a Hindi daily narrowly escaped an axe attack on his life on Thursday at Paharpur in East Champaran for allegedly failing to publish photographs in the newspaper.

Confirming the incident, Paharpur officer-in-charge KB Shukla said Nand Kishore and his father, Harendra Kishore Paswan, had been made named accused in an FIR. "The search is on to arrest the duo," he said.

At the time of filing this report, photojournalist Amrendra Kumar was admitted in Sadar Hospital, Motihari, with injuries to his neck and hand.

According to Amrendra, the accused duo had been coercing him to publish their photographs related to Ambedkar Jayanti organised at Shishwakodar village in East Champaran's Paharpur block.

The duo reached Amrendra's house on Wednesday night and hurled expletives not finding him around. "They came two my place this morning again and hit me with a sharp weapon. I escaped only after I rushed inside and bolted the door of my house," he said.

"Before fleeing, they also damaged my motorcycle," he added.

In a similar incident, a Motihari-based photojournalist, Devendra Kumar Singh, was roughed up and his camera was damaged during the nationwide shutdown by various Dalit organizations on April 2 called against Supreme Court's order on SC/ST (Atrocities) Act, 1989.