Days after a 27-year-old video journalist succumbed to his injuries in Jaipur after being assaulted by three men, his friend, who is also an employee of a private news channel and was a witness to the attack, said that nobody helped them at the time of the incident in front of a roadside eatery.
According to the police, Abhishek Soni, 27, died at a hospital in Jaipur on December 23, a fortnight after the attack which took place on the night of December 8.
The 29-year-old private channel employee said she received several stitches as she was also injured in the attack.
“My friend Abhishek Soni worked with a private news channel as a video journalist and he would also shoot for weddings. On December 8, we were returning from such an event and since he was using my mobile for the shoot, I had accompanied him. After 10 pm, we were sitting inside our car at a roadside eatery near Narayan Vihar where we had stopped for dinner. Three men who had arrived on a motorcycle were also there and we noticed that they were staring at me,†the woman told The Sunday Express. She said Abhishek got out of the car to confront the men.
“Abhishek went to them and asked why they were staring at me. The men left but a short while later came back and started assaulting him with an iron rod. When I caught one of them, they beat me too with the rod and I lost consciousness. There were other people too at the eatery and around us but nobody came to help us. It was all over within a matter of minutes. Later, when we regained consciousness, Abhishek drove towards the hospital but on our way too we didn’t find any police outposts or officials,†said the woman.
A case has been filed under IPC sections 302 (murder), 323 (voluntarily causing hurt), 341 (wrongful restraint) and 354A (sexual harassment) on the basis of her complaint, police said.
“After the two of them went to the hospital, the police came to know about the incident through the control room… After investigation we identified the three accused and one of them, 19-year-old Shankar Choudhary, has been arrested. Two other accused, including a juvenile, are absconding and efforts are being made to nab them,†said Dilip Kumar Soni, SHO of Mansarovar police station.
Soni said the accused are students and the arrested person has claimed that it was Abhishek who had assaulted them with a rod from the car and they acted in self-defence. Asked why the eatery was open during the night curfew imposed in wake of the pandemic, Soni said that the eatery was closed from outside and had curtains drawn.
Family members of Abhishek said they are not satisfied with the police action so far.
