A journalist was assaulted in Jammu’s Kathua on Wednesday after his questions to BJP leaders on security lapses struck a raw nerve.

The Dainik Jagran’s Rakesh Sharma had covered a BJP protest at Kalibari chowk against the Pahalgam massacre before he was assaulted. He told The Telegraph that local MLAs Devinder Manyal, Rajiv Jasrotia and Bharat Bhushan took questions from reporters after the protest.

“I asked them whether terrorism would end by burning effigies or taking Pakistan’s name every day. He (Manyal) said you are right; we will now speak to the PM,” 58-year-old Sharma said.

On the MLAs’ claim that the security was now tight, Sharma said he remarked that if the Border Security Force (BSF) was capable, there would have been no infiltration.

“One Himanshu Sharma then called me a separatist and said that I am not a journalist. When he said that, I told other reporters there that we should boycott them. We all walked out and were standing in a corner…. A former BJP district general secretary, Ravinder Singh, attacked me from behind. He kicked and punched me.”

A video of the incident shows Sharma being assaulted and chased from a bus stop before cops intervene. He alleged that the assailants were associated with the BJP and the RSS.

“There were more than five of them. ‘Jamke maro (hit him hard),’ they shouted…. DSP Ravinder Singh rescued me and took me to the Government Medical College (Kathua)…. The BJP has not apologised to me. I am recovering at home now.”

MLA Jasrotia told this paper: “What happened is very unfortunate. I have had personal ties to his family since my father’s time. The media has the right to ask questions. During protests, we can’t control everyone. When Rakeshji was asking questions, one person interrupted him and the journalists left after that. Some 10 minutes later, we found out that he had been hit.”

He added that he and the other MLAs did not witness the assault. “Those who hit him are not BJP people, they were not office-bearers. These people have misused the party’s name,” Jasrotia said.

The police filed an FIR after a delegation of journalists from Jammu met senior officials.

A journalist who was part of the delegation told this paper: “We were told that these men who hit him have other cases against them as well…. Sometime ago, tempers flared up during a BJP media conference when journalists asked about the increasing cases of infiltration. In the last three years, at least 20 people have been killed in this part of the state in terrorist violence. Some of these same men heckled Rakeshji and others who asked questions, saying that the Congress had sent them.”

Congress spokesman Ravinder Sharma said: “The only crime of Rakesh Sharma was that he asked certain undesirable questions over the security situation in the wake of the Pahalgam terror attack on Tuesday and a series of terror attacks in various parts of Kathua district in the recent past…. He has identified the BJP leaders and the video recording of the incident is reflective of the gravity of the attack but no appropriate action seems to have been taken so far. Any other ordinary assailant would have been behind bars by now, but these are people affiliated to the BJP.”