The Uttar Pradesh government on Tuesday bulldozed a wedding hall belonging to Wazid Beg, a Samajwadi Party leader and an associate of jailed Sunni leader
Maulana Tauqeer Raza, in Bareilly.
Raza, the head of the socio-political organisation Ittehad-e-Millat Council, was arrested on September 27 on the charge of instigating a mob to violence a day before.
The Bareilly Development Authority (BDA) and the police have claimed that the wedding hall at the Faridpur Chaudhary locality under Izzatnagar police station was built on a 1,200sqm plot without a sanctioned plan.
Deepak Kumar, joint secretary of the BDA, said: “The owner of the plot didn’t apply for building approval or land use. We followed the court order and served a 15-day notice to its owner before taking legal action.”
An associate of Beg said: “He had submitted all documents, but the authorities ignored them. They came with three bulldozers on Tuesday and demolished his structure.”
Bareilly superintendent of police Manush Pareek said the building was sealed on October 6 following the BDA notice. “We came to know during our investigation of the September 26 incident that the rioters had held a meeting in the same building a few days before the violence. The BDA bulldozed the property and we provided security to the team,” he said.
Holding placards with slogans of “I love Mohammad” written on them, Raza’s followers had taken out a procession in Bareilly after Friday prayer. A clash ensued after the police tried to stop the marchers. Raza, who was kept under house arrest at that time, had claimed that 20 people were injured in lathicharge by the police.
