Six persons have been arrested on charges of lynching a man from the minority community for allegedly stealing vegetables from a farm in Jamtara district of Jharkhand on Tuesday night.

Jamtara police arrested the accused on Wednesday evening on the basis of an FIR filed by one Binod Mondal, who was grievously injured in the incident. Another accused is still absconding, the police said.

“We were informed about the incident late on Tuesday night. On reaching the spot, we found Binod, 50, writhing in pain near a bush close to the farm in Karmatar. He said his friend Yusuf Mia alias Lal Mohammed, 46, had been thrown in the well. We recovered the body from the well and sent it for post-mortem to Jamtara Sadar Hospital on Wednesday. On the basis of the FIR lodged by Binod, we have arrested six of the named accused while one is absconding,” said R.S. Tiwary, officer in charge of Karmatar police station.

Binod was referred to Patliputra Medical College and Hospital (PMCH) in Dhanbad on Thursday.

Tiwary said Yusuf and Binod were residents of Kashitand village under Karmatar police station.

“Both the deceased and the injured were from Kashitand village which is close to Karmatar village where the incident took place. There have been incidents of vegetables (like ridge gourd, bitter gourd and cucumber) being stolen from farms in the last fortnight. Subsequently, villagers of Karmatar had started night vigil. On Tuesday night they spotted four persons entering the farm of Mahendra Singh. On raising an alarm, two persons fled while the villagers managed to catch hold of Yusuf and Binod and beat them with rods, sticks and rained blows,” said Tiwary.

When Yusuf and Binod lost consciousness, they were thrown in a well by the irate villagers. But, Binod managed to climb out using the ladder in the well but lost consciousness near a bush. But Yusuf could not climb out and died in the well, the officer said.

“On getting information from the village chowkidar, we rushed to Karmatar and recovered Yusuf’s body from the well and sent it for post-mortem to Sadar Hospital on Wednesday. Binod was also rushed to Sadar Hospital from where he was referred to PMCH Dhanbad. We have lodged a case under Section 302 (murder) along with other sections of the IPC against the accused,” Tiwary said.

Jamtara superintendent of police Anshuman Kumar ruled out that it was a communal incident. “It was merely a violent reaction by villagers against thieves. There is nothing communal in it and there has been no untoward incident or reaction anywhere in the district,” he said.

Karmatar is around 220km northeast of state capital Ranchi.

Jharkhand, which has witnessed over 22 cases of alleged mob lynching between 2015 and December 2019, was termed the “lynching capital” by CPM politburo member Brinda Karat last year.