A police official in Indore was removed from his position as a station in-charge for baton charging members of the Bajrang Dal who blocked roads and vandalised vehicles during a protest on Thursday evening.

On Thursday, members of the Hindutva organisation were staging a sit-in agitation against alleged drug trading in the busy Palasiya square in Indore, Hindi daily Dainik Bhaskar reported. They did not budge even as the police repeatedly asked them to disperse.

As a traffic jam ensued due to the protest, the police baton charged the Bajrang Dal members. Some of the protestors then fled to the adjoining Chhappan Dukan area, where they vandalised some vehicles and threw stones at the police.

Five policemen were injured in the violence and 11 Bajrang Dal members were taken into custody, Deputy Commissioner of Police Dharmendra Singh Bhadoria said, according to PTI. Those detained were released on bail on Friday morning.

Madhya Pradesh Home Minister Narottam Mishra said on Friday that an official of the rank of additional director general will conduct an inquiry into the matter. Sanjay Singh, who was in charge of the Palasiya police station, has been line attached, the minister said.

Line attaching is a disciplinary action under which police officials are removed from their duties and posted in the barracks temporarily.

Deputy Commissioner of Police Bhadoria told reporters on Thursday that the Bajrang Dal members had not taken permission to hold the protest.

They had said they would submit a memorandum listing their demands, but more than 500 persons assembled, leading to chaos and a traffic jam, the police official said, according to Dainik Bhaskar.