A 33-year-old officer of Indian army was on Friday, 29 July, allegedly assaulted in Bengaluru by a group of unknown people on the road for “being a North Indian who did not know how to drive.”
According to initial reports by The News Minute and Bangalore Mirror, the incident took place near SCT Institute of Technology in Kaggadasapura.
The officer of the rank of Major was stuck in slow-moving traffic in his SUV when an auto driver enraged by traffic jam, started accusing the victim of not knowing how to drive.
Murali Kartik, a techie and an eye witness, told Bangalore Mirror that the auto driver attacked the army officer without any provocation.
According to the witness, the major was innocent and the auto driver picked a fight for no reason. The victim did not even come out of the car and was unable to understand the language in which the auto driver was speaking.
The Major warned the auto driver to stop else he would report the matter to the police while taking pictures of the driver. The auto-driver then flew into a rage and – along with four other passers-by, who were in no way connected to the incident, ganged up with the driver and started damaging the vehicle.
He was then pulled out of the car and was brutally beaten by spanners and was bleeding profusely when Kartik came to his rescue.
Kartik further added that “There were nearly 40 onlookers and nobody came to the victim’s rescue, despite his pleas for help. I started pushing the assailants, asking them not to beat him as he would die. With great difficulty, I rescued the victim and the accused ran away.”
Kartik then rushed the Major to Sri Lakshmi Hospital in Kaggadasapura where he was administered treatment. Once at the hospital, the major then called his friends to help him.
The Major, who doesn’t wish to be identified, has been posted in Karnataka since 2014 and knows very little Kannada. He after treatment on July 30 filed a complaint with the Baiyappanahalli police under section 324 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC).
The pictures, which the Major managed to click of the driver and others who beat him, were handed over to the police for further investigation.
The spot where the incident occurred sees regular traffic jams.
“The condition of the victim would have been even more critical had the civilian not displayed courage to counter the five weapon-wielding gang-members,” the victim’s friend, a Wing Commander in the Indian Air Force, told Bangalore Mirror.
Another friend of the victim, also an army officer, told The News Minute that the attackers were visibly enraged by the number plate of the victim’s car that bore a Haryana registration.
Speaking to The News Minute on condition of anonymity, the friend said that army officers across the country have always been vulnerable to such attacks, since their car registration is an indication that they are not a native of the place.
“I wish those 40 onlookers, instead watching the victim being beaten, could have just warned the accused and sent them away,” Kartik, the witness added.
