Nabarangpur/Jharigaon: Police arrested Friday Kunu Tiwari on charges of hurling eggs and stones at Nabarangpur BJD MP Ramesh Majhi while the latter was campaigning Thursday at Ichhapur for party candidates in the three-tier panchayat polls.
Angry over the arrest, hundreds of local people staged protests and tried to barge into the Jharigaon police station Friday to free the accused.
Apprehending trouble, police had shut the entrance to the station. However, agitators tried to force open the gates and were seen tugging and pulling furiously in an effort to enter the police station.
The accused Tiwari was arrested following a written complaint by Priyaranjan Das, the block representative of Majhi. However, immediately after the arrest of Tiwari more than 500 supporters of the accused gathered in front of the police station demanding his immediate release.
However, with reinforcements arriving with Umerkote SDPO at the Jharigaon police station, the agitators dispersed.
Later, former MP and BJP leader Balabhadra Majhi and his associate Chandrabhanu Nayak held talks with police officials on the issue for quick solution.
Sources said that had it not been for the prompt arrival of police reinforcements, the situation could have gone out of control. They alleged that some of the agitators had tried to break the locks of the Jharigaon police station.
PNN