Bhubaneswar/Baripada, Oct. 26: A youth hurled eggs at chief minister Naveen Patnaik at a public meeting in Mayurbhanj today shortly before he was to address the gathering.

Despite tight security at the meeting venue at Suliapada in Mayurbhanj, 22-year-old Risitosh Patra, a resident of Baripada, managed to sneak up near the dais and allegedly hurled eggs towards Naveen. The eggs missed their target. The cops caught hold of him after BJD workers nearby beat him up.

POACH PROTEST

An eyewitness said Patra, who was sitting near the media enclosure, suddenly got up and started hurling eggs towards the dais. He missed the target by nearly 15ft and the eggs fell near the stage, which was empty for security reasons.

Though there was no official confirmation by the police about the egg attack, Patra was taken into custody. The official version was that he had waved a black handkerchief at Naveen.

Baripada sub-divisional police officer Abhimanyu Nayak said: "We did not see him hurling eggs. But, the youth was waving a black handkerchief. He has been taken into custody after the cloth was seized from his possession."

"He is being be booked for creating public nuisance, disrupting law and order and obstructing the police from doing their duty," said Nayak.

This was the second egg attack on the chief minister. On February 19, 2015, Youth and Student Congress activists had hurled eggs at the chief minister's carcade in Bhubaneswar, while he was on his way to attend a programme at the Utkal University in Vani Vihar.

The police arrested several Youth and Student Congress leaders and they were even booked on charges of attempt to murder. Senior police officers in charge of providing security to the chief minister's carcade were transferred.

Though there was a let up in egg attacks on the chief minister after security was tightened, there were several incidents of egg attacks on other cabinet ministers during their visits to various districts of the state over the past two years.

Keeping the egg attack incident in mind, elaborate security arrangements were made during chief minister's visit to the Utkal University campus on August 1.

The government had deployed 900 policemen and the chief minister was escorted by 1,500 motorcycle-borne youths.

Today, the chief minister inaugurated several projects and also laid the foundation stone for many projects at the meeting. Naveen attended programmes at Saraskona, Bahalda and Jashipur.

He has been visiting the districts in view of the approaching panchayat elections that are due early next year.