Policemen were seen mercilessly beating people inside a house.
Patna:
The brutal police brutality that would have made the British East India Company proud was caught on camera in Bihar’s Buxar district on Wednesday when dozens of policemen raided sleeping farmers in their homes and brutally beat them with canes in the middle of the night.
The police action was against a group of farmers who had been protesting for over two months demanding better rates for their land being acquired by a state-run power company in Chausa block of the district. Who are residents of Banarpur village about 140 km west. Where is Patna?
The police said that they were first attacked by the farmers, a claim denied by the farmers. In CCTV footage released by the farmers, a group of policemen can be seen milling around outside a house before assaulting them.
Cellphone videos recorded by attackers inside a house show policemen brutally beating people, including women, and breaking down doors.
The farmers said the attack was led by Amit Kumar, a senior officer of the Mufassil police station, who was responding to a complaint filed by the SJVN Power Plant.
The police are yet to explain why they went to answer the complaint against the protest in the middle of the night after the farmers had gone home.
The farmers said they were peacefully protesting against the company for a fresh round of land acquisition for the project at the rates fixed about 12 years ago when the plots were last bought.
SJVN, earlier known as Satluj Jal Vidyut Nigam, started construction of a 1320 MW coal power plant in the region last year.