BHOPAL: A senior state government official has been seriously injured in an attack by armed men in Rewa district of Madhya Pradesh. The attack which happened on Tuesday evening was allegedly carried out by 18-20 armed men, including a local BJP leader believed to be close to the ruling party MLA KP Tripathi.

The attack on 58-year-old Sirmour janpad panchayat chief executive officer (CEO) S K Mishra happened just a few hours after the MLA had a heated exchange of words over phone with him. The audio-clip of the purported conversation had gone viral just an hour before the alleged attack on Mishra near the Purwa Waterfalls.

“I was returning from an official work in the car driven by my driver, when 18-20 men armed with lathis got the car stopped by parking their vehicles in front of it. As the car’s doors were locked from inside, they first damaged the windows of the car and then pulled me out. Subsequently, they attacked me indiscriminately and then left the spot, leaving me behind. I’ve identified three of them, including BJP Bankuiyan Mandal president Manish Shukla and two others, Vinay Shukla and Vivek Gautam,” Mishra alleged at the hospital later in the evening.

The senior government official accused the BJP MLA from Semariya seat of Rewa district KP Tripathi of being behind the attack. “The attack happened just a few hours after he had threatened to teach me a lesson for not getting his work done. There is a threat to my life from him and his men,” he alleged further.

“The MLA has been pressuring me for a year to get works done as per his wishes, including reinstating a transferred panchayat secretary Sandeep Dwivedi. I had clearly told him over phone on Tuesday to get me transferred, but he (MLA) told me that he wouldn’t waste his energy in getting me transferred, but would do something more. Just a few hours after the telephonic conversation, the attack happened on me,” Mishra alleged.

While the BJP MLA couldn’t be contacted over phone in the matter, his personal assistant Dharmendra Dwivedi said the attack shouldn’t be linked to the telephonic conversation between the legislator and the Janpad Panchayat CEO, as such conversations are part of routine processes. “It’s some other group which has tried to take advantage of the telephonic conversation and attacked the Janpad Panchayat CEO,” Dwivedi said.

To boycott work till attackers held: Panchayat head
Meanwhile, the newly-elected Sirmour Janpad Panchayat head Raveena Saket (who was reportedly a BJP backed candidate) has said that neither the Sirmour Janpad Panchayat nor any of the village panchayats coming under its jurisdiction will work till those accused of attacking the CEO aren’t nabbed by the police.”