The BJP functionaries on Saturday assaulted a Chhattisgarh based journalist while he was recording party's district-level meeting in Raipur.
A complaint has been registered against four persons based on the complaint by reporter Suman Pandey, who suffered minor injuries on his head.
He identified the other three accused as local BJP office-bearers Vijay Vyas, Utkarsh Trivedi and Deena Dongre. No arrests have been made until now.
In his complaint, the journalist alleged that he was beaten when he was covering the BJP meeting on Saturday afternoon at its Ekatma Parisar office in Raipur. The leaders themselves were involved in a scuffle among when the incident happened.
Advertisement
"I was recording a video of the meeting on my mobile phone when suddenly BJP leaders started manhandling each other over some issue. Meanwhile, BJP Raipur district president Rajeev Agarwal and another person, Utkarsh Trivedi, asked me to delete the video of the scuffle, which I refused. They then started hitting me and forcefully deleted the video," Mr Pandey said.
"I was made to sit inside the meeting room for about 20 minutes. When I came out, I informed other journalists about the incident," he added.
State BJP spokesperson Sacchidanand Upasane, who was also present in the meeting, said his party men had apologised to Pandey.
"The closed-door district level meeting was held to review the defeat in the recent Assembly election. Media persons were asked to leave the meeting room after taking initial footage. Party leaders and workers were also asked to keep their mobile switched off," he said.
Advertisement
"On finding a man recording the video of the meeting, he was told to stop it and asked to delete the footage. After he introduced himself as a journalist, party leaders said he should delete the video," Upasane said.
"A minor scuffle broke out between the journalist and party leaders over the issue, following which I asked the journalist to sit there for a while and later told him to go outside," Upasane said.
When party leaders saw journalists protesting at the venue, the former apologised, he added.
He said the BJP's state president would look into the incident.
(With inputs from PTI)
