Top anti-Posco stir leader held on dowry, assault charges

Abhaya Sahu, one of the most senior leaders of the protests against Korean steelmaker Posco's project in Jagatsinghpur district of Orissa, was arrested by local police on Friday evening as he was returning from Bhubaneshwar, the state capital, to his village in Tirtol area near Paradip.

A police team stopped Sahu's car on the Manijanga-Erasama road near the project site and took him in custody. Police said he was arrested in connection with about a dozen cases pending against him, including assault and imposition of fines on people who did not support him.

Police officials in Jagatsinghpur said Sahu was arrested over the suicide of a woman allegedly due to dowry demands, among other cases. The woman's parents have alleged that their daughter's corpse was burnt hastily at the behest of Sahu.

Jagatsinghpur district Superintendent of Police Devdutta Singh said, "Sahu was arrested for his involvement in several cases including tampering evidence in a dowry death case and atrocity against Scheduled Caste persons."

Sahu, 54, is the head of the Posco Pratirodh Sangram Samiti (PPSS), a Communist Party of India-backed organisation. He vehemently refuted the police charges and said he had been implicated in false cases.

Sahu has been leading the agitation for the last six years against land acquisition for the proposed $12 billion (Rs54,000 crore) steel project, billed as the largest single foreign direct investment ever in the country.