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LUCKNOW, India (AP) – Indian police on Saturday arrested the son of a young minister in Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government as a suspect days after nine people were killed in a deadly escalation of year-long protests by tens of thousands of farmers against contentious farm laws in northern India, a police officer said.
Four farmers died on Sunday when a car belonging to Deputy Home Secretary Ajay Mishra ran over a group of protesting farmers in Lakhimpur Kheri, a town in the state of Uttar Pradesh, officials and officials said. heads of operations.
Farm leaders alleged that Mishra’s son was in the car when she ran over the protesters, but Mishra denied. His driver and three members of the ruling Bharatiya Janata party, who were in a car, were all killed by protesters by hitting them with sticks during the violence that erupted after the incident.
Police officer Upendra Agarwal said on Saturday that Ashish Misra was arrested following a one-day interrogation in the town after “he provided no supporting evidence to prove that he was not present in any of the three vehicles which passed through a crowd of farmers killing Four of them. “
His father Ajay Mishra said his son was innocent and was not present.
The arrest came a day after India’s highest court criticized the state government for failing to arrest Ashish Mishra, against whom a criminal murder case is being investigated by police. On Friday, Mishra made the police wait for hours for questioning before sending a message saying he was not well and could not come.
Darshan Pal, a farmer leader, and Akhilesh Singh, a leader of the opposition Congress party, demanded his father’s removal from Modi’s government.
Police said earlier this week that they had so far arrested six people and filed a criminal complaint against 14 others, including the minister’s son, in connection with the deaths of the four farmers. The BJP also filed a criminal complaint against the farmers for the deaths of its members and the driver of the car, said Arvind Chaurasia, a senior official in charge of the district.
Police also said they recovered the body of a local journalist where violence broke out on Sunday, but did not provide more details on how he was killed.
The violence has marked an escalation in ongoing protests against farming laws that farmers say will shatter their livelihoods. The protests have been going on since the government passed the laws last September and have been one of Modi’s biggest challenges.
Last week, thousands of farmers gathered on the outskirts of the capital New Delhi to mark a year of protests. The government says changes in laws were necessary to modernize agriculture and boost production through private investment. But farmers say the laws will devastate their incomes by ending guaranteed prices and force them to sell their crops to companies at lower prices.
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