BJP fact-finding team held for defying ban order

The police on Wednesday arrested the members of fact- finding committee appointed by the Bharatiya Janata Party to probe the cause of the last week’s riots in the Old City.

The party's fact-finding team members were arrested as they had not taken the permission of the authorities to visit the violence-affected Old City, the police sources said.

Although curfew was lifted in 25 police station limits of the Old City on Wednesday, Section 144 was in force in the all the riot-hit areas. Section 144 prohibits assembly of five or more persons, the sources said.

The Bjp activists staged a sit-in and picked an argument with police in protest against the arrests. Sensing trouble, the police took some activists into custody and shifted them to Gandhinagar police station.

The Bjp committee was constituted to go into the cause of the violence in the Old City and the handling of the situation after the riots. Earlier, the Bjp blamed the Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (MIM) for riots. The government was turning a blind eye to the atrocities perpetrated by the MIM.