The High Grounds police arrested three people, including two women, for assaulting policemen and for preventing them from discharging their duty. The arrested were identified as Satish Puranik, a software engineer, Prajakta Mahendar, a doctor at Narayana Hrudayalaya and Vandana Puranik, who claimed to be a journalist, but was later found to be false.
Police said the incident occurred around 3.15 am on Tuesday in front of Mount Carmel College on Palace Road. The trio, along with two other women and a man, were sitting on their car bonnet (KA-04-MF-7161) and drinking liquor. High Grounds police constable Mukundaiah, who was on night beat, stopped his motorcycle and enquired with them. The constable apparently asked them not to make noise and to go home.
The women in the group shouted back at the constable asking him to enforce his ‘policing’ in Shivajinagar. The constable immediately alerted night beat police sub inspector (PSI) Shobha. “The revelers got violent with the PSI and assaulted her. One of the women in the group, Vandana, tugged at the whistle guard of the PSI and hit her on the left shoulder. The other woman also attacked the PSI from behind while Vandana threatened to report against the officer through influential people. The car bore a press sticker, but Vandana’s claims of being a journalist proved to be false”, a senior police official said.
The High Grounds took all the six into custody and took them for a medical test to Bowring Hospital. Later, police arrested three people and booked them under Sections 353 (assault or criminal force to deter public servant from discharging duty), 506 (criminal intimidation) and 504 (causing insult with intent to provoke breach of peace) of IPC. The accused were produced before the magistrate and remanded to judicial custody till August 22.