The inhabitants of a small rural settlement massacred five beggars belonging to a nomadic community of the state. On social media they were referred to as "child snatchers and pedophiles". The police who tried to calm the population also attacked.
Delhi (AsiaNews) - An angry mob lynched five people to death in the western state of Maharashtra. The anger of the population was triggered by false accusations, circulated on social media, which defined the five " child snatchers". Local police confirmed what happened to the BBC.
The victims, an agent explains, are part of a nomadic community of the state. They were passing through a village asking for alms when they were surrounded by the inhabitants, convinced that they were pedophiles intent on abducting their children. Suspicions, fomented by messages on WhatsApp and other social networks, were incited when one of the five stopped to talk to a girl.
Police agent M. Ramkumar recounts: "The inhabitants stopped them and questioned them. Not satisfied with the answers, they locked them in a room and beat them with bamboo pipes and stones ". When the agents arrived at the scene, they were attacked in turn. The police imposed a curfew on the village, currently under the control of special forces.
The lynchings fomented by social media, says a local MP, "are becoming endemic in India". Last June, two young people died in Assam because they were suspected of crimes they never committed. For this reason, the authorities have asked the population to "refrain from taking justice into their own hands”.