LUCKNOW, NOV 16: After a virtual crackdown on the devotees to check them from offering prayers to ``Goddess Sati'', the local administration has now decided to keep a tight vigil at a mela scheduled to be held at Charkhari on November 19, 8 km from Satpurwa, the village where the incident took place on November 11. ``We will have to take extra care to ensure that no glorification of Sati takes place as such sentiments send wrong messages to gullible villagers. The mela will provide an ideal platform to those trying to project the suicide as `sati','' L Ravi Kumar, SP, Mahoba, told The Indian Express. As a result of the police crackdown, the number of devotees to the place where 45-year-old Charan Shah burnt herself on the pyre of her husband has been reduced virtually to nil with policemen keeping a close vigil and also using force, if required to keep the devotees at bay.
An FIR on self-immolation has been lodged at Charkhari police station and the police claim that it was lodged on the same daywhen the incident was first reported. No arrests have been made under NSA so far, the SP said.Meanwhile, the NGOs have now decided that the death should not be glorified because it will set a wrong precedent.
Copyright © 1999 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.
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