The wife of a property dealer and Yogi Adityanath “admirer” who died after being allegedly assaulted by police in a Gorakhpur hotel has said police had tried to mislead and intimidate her, and a video has emerged of senior officers purportedly trying to dissuade her from registering a case.

Meenakshi Gupta, the wife of 36-year-old Manish Gupta who died after six drunken cops allegedly beat him up and also hit him on the head with a rifle butt early on Tuesday when he took time to furnish an identity proof during an “inquiry”, told reporters at her Kanpur home on Thursday: “I have evidences to prove that even though I had tweeted to the chief minister on Tuesday about the incident in detail. The district magistrate and superintendent of police of Gorakhpur kept asking me not to register a case against the killers. Some policemen tried to intimidate and mislead me.”

Manish and two friends were apparently visiting Gorakhpur, to which Adityanath is closely linked, to witness the “development” of the area. They were allegedly assaulted by policemen who were making enquiries at the hotel over a suspicion that three persons had put up there under a false ID.

Later on Thursday, Meenakshi, who has a five-year-old son, got an audience with the Uttar Pradesh chief minister who was visiting Kanpur city to attend government programmes.

She said after the meeting: “I am satisfied as the chief minister has agreed to give me the job of an officer on special duty in the Kanpur Development Authority and a compensation of more than Rs 10 lakh for the education of my son. He has also agreed to transfer the case from Gorakhpur to Kanpur. I requested him for a CBI inquiry and he asked me to send him an application. He assured me that he would recommend a CBI probe.”

Meenakshi demanded that the six policemen booked for murder be arrested soon.

Adityanath said at a public meeting in Kanpur just before meeting Meenakshi: “An incident took place in Gorakhpur two days ago. I immediately asked the police to register a case. The guilty wouldn’t be spared.”

The post-mortem report mentions four injuries to Manish’s head, face and body.

Meenakshi said she had gone to the hotel room on Wednesday at the same time when some policemen reached there. “The room initially looked clean and there was no trace of violence or blood. But then I spotted a white towel that had been used to wipe blood from the floor. It was kept under the bed. I handed it over to the police. The owner and staff of the hotel are involved in the crime,” she said.

Subhash Shukla, the owner of Hotel Krishna Palace, said: “The police took the room key from us early on Tuesday. We don’t know what they did in the room after that. The cops went through the register and said the SP had sent them to check hotels and make videos as there were security concerns before Diwali. They took hotel manager Adarsh Pandey with them and went to Room No. 512. After 15 minutes, I saw four policemen carrying Manish and putting him in a jeep. He was unconscious.”

He said the police took away all 16 CCTV cameras at the hotel, including the three on the fifth floor where Manish’s room was located.

A relative of Meenakshi, who refused to be identified, on Thursday shared a video with journalists in Kanpur in which two men resembling Gorakhpur DM Vijay Kiran Anand and police chief Vipin Tada can be seen trying to convince Meenakshi not to register a case.

The relative said the video had been recorded on Tuesday evening when the two officers had allegedly called Meenakshi to a room at BRD Medical College where Manish had been declared dead on arrival.

“They tried to prevent her from registering an FIR against the killer policemen and told her that since they had suspended the cops and started a case, there was no need for her to do anything,” the relative said.

The man resembling DM Anand is seen saying: “Main aur kaptan sahab swayam nigrani karenge…. Mera anurodh tha maan lijiye, aapko ek bade bhai ki haisiyat se.… Mukadma hone ke baad, aapko andaza hai ki nahi, salon tak court mein… (The SP and I will personally monitor the investigation. Please accept my request. I am saying this to you as an elder brother. I don’t know whether you understand that the case would drag on for years in court).”

The man resembling SP Tada is heard saying, probably referring to the six accused policemen: “Unka pehle se koi jhagra tha nahin, wo gaye thhe wardi pehen ke. Isi liye aapki baat sun rahe hain. Madam ne kaha nilambit kar dijiye, maine kar diya. Tab tak bahal nahin honge jab tak clean chit nahin milega (They didn’t have any dispute in the past, they had gone there in uniform. That is why I am listening to you. Madam wanted me to suspend them, which I did. They will not be reinstated unless they get a clean chit).”

Tada and Anand didn’t reply to questions from the media on the video.

“An inquiry is in progress and we should wait for the results,” the DM said.

The SP said: “I don’t know anything about this video. We are doing our job.”

The complaint on the basis of which the six cops have been booked for murder was filed by Meenakshi on Wednesday.

Police sources said it was “routine” for a section of cops in Gorakhpur to raid hotels to extort money from guests.

“They are mostly hand-in-glove with the hotels’ management. Hotel staff inform the police whenever someone checks in. The police will suddenly enter your room late at night and ask for identity card and then point out some ‘mistake’ in it,” an officer in Lucknow said on the condition of anonymity.

“In case, there is liquor in the room, the police threaten to book the guests for breach of peace. The motive is to extort money. This has been going on openly for many years,” the officer added.

Manish’s friends Pradeep Singh and Hardeep Singh Chauhan had said the policemen had barged into their room around 12.30am on Tuesday and demanded to see their IDs. They assaulted Manish when he took time to fish out his ID card, his friends had said on Wednesday. The police had initially said Manish wads drunk and he fell and hurt himself during questioning.

Pushp Dant Jain, vice-president of the Uttar Pradesh Vyapari Kalyan Board, has demanded a judicial probe.
In a letter to the chief minister, the traders’ body leader said: “Kindly issue an order that the police wouldn’t harass tourists and travellers in the name of an inquiry. Video recording must be done in case a raid is conducted at a hotel or restaurant.”

In her handwritten police complaint, Meenakshi had named the station house officer of Ramgarh Tal in Gorakhpur city, Jagat Narayan Singh, inspector Akshay Mishra, sub-inspectors Vijay Yadav and Rahul Dubey, head constable Kamlesh Yadav and constable Prashant Kumar.

Samajwadi Party president Akhilesh Yadav met Meenakshi at her home on Thursday morning and later told reporters: “I know that the truth will never come out under the current dispensation. The government uses officers for misdeeds….”

The former chief minister demanded the suspension of the DM and SP of Gorakhpur.

BSP leader and former chief minister Mayawati tweeted: “Not arresting the guilty raises serious questions on the policy and intention of the government.”