Delhi's mean streets: Why the brutal murder of Shahnawaz is no surprise

Late on Sunday night, 40-year-old Shahnawaz was travelling home on his motorcycle with his two sons 12-year-old Fahad and 9-year-old Kaif when his car brushed against a car neat Turkman gate. What followed was official apathy, a brutal murder that made national headlines and protests.

“My son’s two-wheeler got stuck in traffic at the Turkman Gate at around 11.30 pm. His vehicle hit a stationary car in front. The man at the wheel asked him to back off but my son said there was no room to do so. The man and his father got off the car and got into an argument. Then they started beating him,” Noorjehan told Indian Express .

Fahad, who witnessed his father’s death said they were merely 100 metres away from the nearest police station. The two sons rushed to get help from the constables waiting there.

“There were two constables there. But when we asked for help, they just walked away,” Fahaad told NDTV .

The men who attacked Shahnawaz were reportedly wearing “knuckle dusters” and beat him up for 15 minutes with iron rods. They then left him in a pool of blood while his two sons rushed back home to call for help.

Clutching the black t-shirt that her son was wearing, the bereaved mother said there was heavy traffic on the road due to a marriage in the area.

“On receiving no help, they came running to me and said ‘Abbu ki kisi se ladai ho gayi hai’ (Father has got into a fight with someone),” she told IANS.

But by the time the family reached the spot it was too late. The family rushed Shahnawaz to the nearby Lok Nayak Jaiprakash Hospital where he was declared dead.

The police has so far arrested one of the accused and Delhi Police commissioner has pledged justice to the family of Shahnawaz but will that suffice The brutal murder of Shahnawaz was not a one-off incident and incidents of road rage are not unheard of in the national capital.

Even on Monday night , there was a case where a MP’s son was attacked by assailants over a parking dispute.

Earlier in March, two management students were attacked by two other men over who should give way. According to a PTI report , the victims, Mandeep Kalita and Arshad Akeel, were going back home from a local gymnasium in a Maruti Swift when a grey Maruti Swift Dzire came from the opposite side.

“Since it was a narrow road, Kalita asked the driver of the Dzire to give way to his car. The driver, however, insisted that Kalita should reverse his vehicle and give way to their vehicle following which an argument sparked off between the two. The driver of the Dzire abused Kalita and came out with other accused and began beating up Kalita. When Akeel rushed to help his friend, the duo thrashed him too. They were also attacked with a baton that was kept in the car by the attackers,” police officials said.

In the case of the two students local residents rushed to help the duo and called the police, something which didn’t happen in Shahnawaz’s case.

But it’s not just the aam aadmi who’s the victim of road rage in the national capital. In October 2014, unknown assailants attacked an Assistant Commissioner of Delhi Police when he attempted to disperse quarrelling motorists.

According to eyewitnesses, Singh had tried to intervene when a biker and car driver were involved in an altercation following an accident.

“Singh, who was passing by in a private vehicle stopped to intervene. Although he was on duty, he was in civil dress and Special Cell officers normally do not wear uniform. The group of men, who were quarrelling among themselves, started assaulting Singh with rods and helmets,” a senior police official was quoted as saying in a report _._

Delhi has seen a massive development of infrastructure over the last decade which means the national capital now has better and wider roads that should ideally translate into stress-free motoring, but as this earlier article on Firstpost  pointed out, that hasn’t happened. The factors that contribute to the road rage on the capital’s streets are blamed on a range of factors from patriarchy and a slow justice system, to high stress.

“The mentality of a driver in Delhi is that I assert my need and my space. But there is no respect for the need and space of a fellow commuter. The city is lacking an attitude that promotes peaceful coexistence,” Dr Nimesh Desai, director of the Institute of Human Behaviour and Allied Sciences in Delhi had told Firstpost. 

Shahnawaz may be another unfortunate statistic but its another grim reminder of how much needs to be done in before Delhi before such incidents reduce.