Puri: Two youths barged into Kanas tehsil office here and attacked five officials including the tehsildar and additional tehsildar Saturday.
The attack is said to be the fallout of past enmity. Some tehsil officials caught hold of the youths and handed them over to the police. The police arrested the accused duo.
The accused were identified as Nilakantha Badajena and Pramod Patra alias Babuli of Chandapada under Kanas panchayat.
According to sources, the tehsil office was open despite a holiday on second Saturday. The officials were busy assessing the loss incurred by the farmers in the district due to the unseasonal rain when Nilakantha and Babuli entered the office at around 12pm.
Additional tehsildar Sahadev Sahu was stepping out of the office to go to an ATM when the youth duo picked up an argument with him and manhandled him. Hearing the noise, tehsildar Sanjay Pratihari, who was in his quarters at that time, rushed to the office and tried to stop the youths. However, the duo attacked did not spare him. Moreover, they assaulted revenue supervisor Rabindra Jena and clerks Jitendra Chhatoi and Sridhar Behera.
Soon other officials rushed to the spot and caught hold of the youths. Later, they called Kanas police who rushed to the spot and arrested the youths.
Some mediapersons claimed to have accessed the footage of the attack which was captured by the CCTV cameras installed at the tehsil office.
The additional tehsildar Sahu suffered injuries on his face. On the basis of a complaint lodged by Sahu, police registered a case.
Kanas inspector-in-charge Ranjan Pradhan said, “Preliminary inquiry states that the tehsildar had warned Nilakantha over construction of a house at Chandpada Square on Delang-Kanas road without mutation of the land. Besides, the tehsildar had also cautioned him over using stones in the construction work. It might have angered the youth.”
Nilakantha’s mother alleged, “The tehsildar had intercepted the stone-laden truck and demanded Rs 30,000. My son had gone to the tehsil office to inquire why the truck was intercepted. However, the officials implicated him in the false case.”
Meanwhile, the district unit of Orissa Administrative Service Association strongly condemned the incident.
PNN