Delhi post office employee hitchhikes, gets assaulted and robbed

A 54-year-old man, working at a Delhi Post office, was assaulted and robbed of his belongings after he tried to hitchhike his way home on Monday night, police said.

A 54-year-old man, working at a Delhi Post office, was assaulted and robbed of his belongings after he tried to hitchhike his way home on Monday night, police said.

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According to the police, the victim, Satish Kumar, of Sector 5, works in Delhi’s Chanakyapuri as a sub post master and was on his way home, when the incident took place.

Kumar said around 7.20 am, he flagged down a private car near Iffco Chowk. He asked the driver to drop him at Mahipalpur in Delhi. “When he boarded the Honda Amaze car, four people, including the driver, were already sitting inside. After driving for half a kilometre, two men who were sitting inside asked him to hand over his belonging and when he refused, they started assaulting him. The driver took a U-turn below Shankar Chowk even as the men kept on hitting the victim, as he resisted . Kumar then asked the men to stop the car at which the driver told him that they would kill him if he didn’t hand over the cash.

Preet Pal Sangwan, assistant commissioner of police (crime), said that the suspects took Rs 27,000 from Kumar’s pocket and dropped him at Shankar Chowk flyover, after making two rounds. The suspects and their vehicleshave been captured in CCTV footage from different locations.

Kumar has told the police that the two ‘passengers’ blindfolded him and assaulted him brutally and that he has suffered injuries all over his body.

“The men threatened him and snatched away his cash, which belonged to his office. The men kept assaulting him until he handed over all the cash he had. The suspects kept threatening him against disclosing the incident to anyone throughout,” Sangwan said.

The men threw Kumar out of the car on the flyover, from where he managed to take a lift and returned home. After a discussion with his family members, he reported the incident to the police on Saturday.

A case under sections 392A (robbery) and 34 (common intention) of the Indian Penal Code was registered at the Sector 17/18 police station against four unidentified persons on Saturday.

The police said they are yet to trace the number of the car. “We have checked CCTV camera footage in the area to ascertain Kumar’s claim and found them to be correct. Teams have been formed to arrest the new lift and loot gang,” Sangwan said.

The police said this is the second such incident reported this month.