The proposed “Hindu Mahapanchayat” at Dada Jalalpur village near Roorkee in Haridwar district was stopped and its supposed organiser, Swami Anand Swaroop, was put under preventive detention in the morning while trying to enter the village and start the event. Several others accompanying him were also detained.
Police detained around 10 people and prevented several others from attending the event. Among them was Swami Dineshanand Bharti, state convener of Kali Sena who was also supposedly one of the organisers of the conclave. Bharti, along with six of his supporters, was detained while trying to enter the village to prepare for the event.
This comes a day after the Supreme Court alerted the Uttarakhand government against a proposed conclave in Roorkee, to be held on lines of the controversial Haridwar Dharam Sansad held in December last year. The local administration also assured that the event won’t be allowed and deployed a heavy police force. Section 144 of CrPC was also clamped in the area.
Anand Swaroop, who heads the “Kali Sena”, had recently called for a “Hindu Mahapanchayat” at Dada Jalalpur village in retaliation to a communal clash that took place in the village on April 16, when stones were allegedly pelted at a Hanuman Jayanti procession.
Swaroop wanted a conclave on the lines of the Haridwar Dharam Sansad held last year -which drew nationwide outrage for hate speeches made against the minority community -to “discuss the stone pelting event”. Notably, Swaroop had recently urged chief minister Pushkar Singh Dhami not to allow “non-Hindus” on the Char Dham route to preserve the “religious sanctity” of the area.
