Mumbai, Jan 12 (IANS) The Maharashtra government Thursday ordered a probe into the atrocity on a Dalit widow who was stripped, paraded and beaten up in Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan’s home district.

Expressing shock over the incident, which happened barely 250 km from the state headquarters, Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar said he has sought a report from the state home department.

“I have requested Home Minister R.R. Patil to take all steps necessary to book the culprits and take strongest action against them,” Pawar told media persons.

Additional Chief Secretary for Home U.C. Sarangi also directed the police to submit a detailed report on the incident.

Fortytwo-year-old Dalit widow Rekha Chavan was allegedly stripped naked, paraded, tied up to a tree and then beaten up by members of an upper caste family of Mulgaon village, in Phatan sub-district of Satara district in western Maharashtra.

Members of upper caste Desai family - who beat her up in the presence of the entire village, which watched on mutely - were reportedly provoked when the widow’s 22-year-old son eloped with a ‘minor’ girl from their family last November.

The angry Desai family members targeted the Dalit widow who attempted to lodge a police complaint before the attack.

The badly injured Rekha Chavan was rushed to Krishna Hospital in the neighbouring town of Kudal.

Police initially refused to register her complaint but Wednesday nabbed five members of the Desai family: Kishen, Hambirao, their wives Shantabai and Sunita, and another woman relative Vimal. All five were booked for “assault or criminal force to woman with an intent to outrage her modesty”.

Meanwhile, prominent Dalit members of the Republican Party of India (RPI) threatened to launch a state wide agitation to protest the shocking incident.

Party president Ramdas Athavale said it was shameful that such an incident could occur in the home district of the chief minister.

He urged the chief minister and the home minister to take immediate and stringent action, failing which he would launch a state wide stir.

Dalit Mahasangh president Machhindra Sake also announced plans to launch an agitation across the state.

“We demand that the state government take action against the upper caste culprits. We also want that the police officials who refused to entertain her initial complaint should be identified and suspended,” Sake told media persons.