Scuffle over water: Dalit farmer beheaded in UP

Bareilly: It all started over sharing a water pipe. Roop Kishore didn't wait a moment before swinging his spade, reportedly decapitating Dalit farmer Natthu Lal Jatav.

The incident took place in Din Nagar Sheikhpur village, about 20 km from Budaun.

UP's perennial problem of water scarcity now turns a killer.

There's a single water pipe running to Jatav's paddy field. On Monday another farmer Roop Kishore wanted to share water from the same pipe.

Jatav was not ready to share, because his field needed more water. An argument broke out and Jatav was verbally abused, according to The Times of India.

Jatav got beaten up in the ensuing scuffle with a stick. Locals tried to stop, but Kishore picked up a spade, and in one go he beheaded Jatav, according to the report.

Stunned, onlookers ran away in fright.

Jatav's son Ompal was quoted as saying that he had been working alongside his father. Then the father had asked him to go home for dinner. However, even hours after the father didn't turn up, when around midnight a local man alerted him of the incident.

Ompal further said that Roop Kishore alone could not have committed the crime and there were a few others with him.

After the incident, police found Kishore hiding in a nearby forest, and the police will probe if more people were involved in the murder.

Jatav's body was handed over to his family after autopsy.

Din Nagar Sheikhpur village has some 600 houses. Scheduled Caste communities make up about 67% of the population, who live on the fringes of poverty.

With inputs from IANS