By PTI
MUMBAI: Pune city police handled the situation tactfully during the 2018 Koregaon-Bhima clashes, preventing a major untoward incident in the city, senior IPS officer Rashmi Shukla has told an inquiry commission.
Shukla, then Pune police commissioner, has submitted a detailed affidavit before the two-member commission headed by Justice (retd) J N Patel which is conducting probe into the violence.
Clashes broke out near the war memorial at Perne in Pune district on January 1, 2018, during the bi-centennial celebration of the Bhima Koregaon battle.
Shukla said the Pune city police had anticipated that a large number of visitors would arrive from all over the state on that day, and had taken adequate precautions and preventive measures.
“Due to said effective deployment of man power/ police force, there was negligible incidence of stone pelting within my jurisdiction or violence in the limits of Pune city,” she said.
There was neither any loss of human life nor any major outbreak of violence in the city.
Also there was no untoward incident in Pune (district) after the evening of January 3, 2018, Shukla added.
Earlier, the commission’s lawyer Ashish Satpute had filed an application seeking that Shukla — now deputed to the CRPF — be directed to file an affidavit.
Dalit organizations commemorate the victory of the East India Company over the Peshwa of Pune in the 1818 battle of Bhima Koregaon, as the British forces included soldiers from the oppressed Mahar community.
Some right-wing organisations had opposed the celebration, leading to violence on January 1, 2018.
One person died and several others including 10 police personnel were injured.
Pune Police later arrested several Left-leaning activists and writers for alleged Maoist connections, claiming that the Elgar Parishad conclave held in Pune on December 31, 2017, had been backed Maoists, and the inflammatory speeches made there triggered the next day’s violence near the Perne memorial.
