India, July 29 -- MEERUT In a gesture of humility, IAS officer Rinku Singh Rahi, the newly appointed sub divisional magistrate of Puwaiyan tehsil in Shahjahanpur, made headlines on Tuesday by publicly performing sit-ups, holding his ears. The act came after he had earlier made a clerk of a local lawyer perform the same punishment for urinating in the open, triggering opposition from lawyers.

Rahi, a 2022-batch IAS officer, had just taken charge as SDM in Puwaiyan on Tuesday. During inspection of tehsil premises, he spotted a clerk (munshi) urinating in the open. Offended by the act, the officer reprimanded the clerk and made him do sit-ups as punishment.

The incident sparked a backlash from lawyers who were already protesting over other...