Bhairahawa, July 5

Three persons, who were involved in Kapilvastu arson incident that claimed 14 lives about 12 years ago, have been finally arrested.

A communal violence had flared up in Kudarbetawa, Chandrauta, Krishnanagar, Shivaraj, Bahadurgunj and Taulihawa areas after a Muslim leader Moid Khan was shot dead in Kapilvastu, on 16 September 2007.

Over the charge of fleeing after setting houses and settlements of hill people in Devipur village on fire, Bhadai Yadav, Jagadish Gupta and Chinku Musalman of Shivaraj Municipality, Bisanpur were arrested by police.

According to District Police Office Kapilvastu DSP Devendra Pande, further investigation has been initiated after the arrested persons were produced at the court today seeking a remand.

In the wake of the incident, police had taken 52 persons in custody, while many others who were complicit in the incident had managed to flee to India. Those who had thus fled also included Indian nationals.

The police had kept the case against the absconders pending.

Besides the deaths, hundreds of people were injured and displaced due to the incident. As per preliminary data, some 1,054 houses and 216 vehicles and other physical property worth over 200 million rupees were damaged in the incident.

The government had formed a high-level judicial investigation committee to look into the incident. The committee led by judge Lokendra Mallik had submitted its report two years later, but the report is yet to be made public. Earlier, a writ had also been filed at the Supreme Court demanding that the report be made public.