Daijiworld Media Network - Bengaluru (MS)

Bengaluru, Nov 16: CCTV footage of an incident, where the owner of a hotel is being caned repeatedly by a senior police officer, has gone viral on social sites. This incident happened on Thursday, November 9, at Shetty Lunch Home, which is situated on Dinnur main road in RT Nagar.

As per the reports, Manjunath Babu, assistant commissioner of police (ACP), JC Nagar, is the officer who allegedly caned Rajeev Shetty, owner of the hotel in front of his staff and customers on the night of November 9. The hoteliers of the city are irked by the incident, in which they say, the officer asked the hotel to be closed at midnight, an hour before the stipulated deadline for closing restaurants.

It is clearly visible in the video that the officer keeps on beating the owner of the restaurant repeatedly in spite of him apologizing. Rajeev Shetty appraised the incident to Chandrashekhar Hebbar, president of Bruhat Bengaluru Hotels' Association, who promptly brought the same to the notice of T Sunil Kumar, police commissioner.

Issuing a statement on the incident, Chandrashekhar Hebbar said, "Bars and restaurants in the city have to close at 11 30 pm on weekdays, whereas restaurants can do business till 1 am on all days of the week as per the directive of the government. November 9 was a Thursday and as an ACP, the officer should have known this rule."

On the other hand, the ACP, in his defense, said, "We have given several warnings to Rajeev in the past but they were ignored. On the day of the incident also when police on duty went to his hotel at midnight, there were five customers still in the restaurant. On getting the information from my men, I personally visited the eatery. When I questioned about the deadline, he replied to me in nasty language."