AGRA: Clashes erupted when Rashtriya Bajrang Dal members were attacked after they vandalised the assistant municipal commissioner’s office on Thursday, triggering a massive traffic jam on the busy MG Road in the city. The Rashtriya Bajrang Dal has been floated recently by ousted VHP leader Pravin Togadia.The incident took place after the members roughed up civic body employees over an anti-encroachment drive. Enraged employees then caught some members of the rampaging mob and beat them in full public view. The police intervened quickly to defuse tension.Acting on complaints of civic body officials, the police registered an FIR against three Bajrang Dal members — identified by cops as Govind Parashar, Rahul and Manish. They were booked on charges of rioting, unlawful assembly, attempt to murder and assaulting public servants under various IPC sections. The three were sent to jail in the evening.On Thursday Govind and his supporters reached the office of assistant municipal commissioner Anupam Shukla to protest against the anti-encroachment drive at Dhandupura and started beating civic body employees, according to Agra Municipal Corporation officials.“During an anti-encroachment drive recently, we took into possession of government land, worth several crores of rupees, illegally occupied by some local residents in Dhandupura. On Thursday, Bajrang Dal members, led by Govind Parashar, barged into my office and threatened me and other officials demanding immediate halt of the anti-encroachment drive,” Shukla told TOI.“When I countered them, they vandalised my office and assaulted me and my staff. This was the second time Parashar assaulted me,” Shukla added.Vinod Allahabadi, president of civic body sanitation workers’ union, said, “Bajrang Dal members took law into their hands. They attacked the assistant municipal commissioner and other staff. Naturally, civic officials got enraged. The goons should remain in jail.”Earlier, Parashar had announced a reward of Rs2 lakh on former Jammu and Kashmir chief minister Omar Abdullah and actor Deepika Padukone over ‘Padmavat’.Mahesh Chandra Gautam, station house officer of Hariparvat said, “Govind Parashar has criminal past. Earlier he had served jail term for vandalising and assaulting government officials.”

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