Mistaken for cattle smugglers, four attacked by mob; one killed

A 38-year-old man was on Saturday beaten to death by angry locals of Najafgarh who mistook him for a cattle smuggler.

August 04, 2014 08:11 am | Updated 08:11 am IST - NEW DELHI:

A 38-year-old man was on Saturday beaten to death by angry locals of Najafgarh who mistook him for a cattle smuggler. The situation turned riotous and left ten others, including five policemen and three colleagues of the deceased, injured.

Three police vehicles were also damaged during the incident. So far, the police have arrested 10 people in connection with it.

According to the police, the deceased, Shankar, worked for a private company which has a contract with the South Delhi Municipal Corporation to pick up dead and stray animals.

“On Saturday evening, four employees of the private company – Shankar, Vijay, Hari Om and Vicky – had gone to a cattle shed in Chhawla. They had been informed about the deaths of four cows and told to remove the carcasses. The four loaded the dead animals and were on their way to a dumping ground of the municipal corporation in Ghazipur when the incident took place,” said a police officer.

The officer added that in the past few days, several cattle smuggling incidents have taken place in the Najafgarh-Chhawla rural belt due to which there was lot of unrest among the locals.

“On Saturday, too, a complaint was received that cattle smugglers were travelling in the mini-truck. The truck had covered around three kilometres when it was stopped by a PCR van. The police team enquired about the carcass, and suspected the four men to be cattle thieves. But before they could explain, locals gathered at the spot and accused the four men of being cattle thieves,” said the officer.

The mob attacked the four men with stones and sticks, and also destroyed the official vehicle of Chhawla police station’s Station House Officer and two police control room vans. The situation was brought under control after a few hours.

The injured were taken to Safdarjung Hospital, where Shankar was declared brought dead. His body was handed over to his family after post-mortem. The Nihal Vihar resident is survived by his wife and seven children – six daughters and a son.

Vijay, Hari Om and Vicky were later taken to Satyabhama Hospital, where their condition continues to be serious.

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