22-year-old shot in leg during firing at Baba Siddique

A bystander, Raj Kanojia, was injured by a bullet during an attack on NCP leader Baba Siddique in Mumbai, now recovering in ICU.

Mumbai: One of the six bullets fired by three assailants at the former state minister and senior NCP leader Baba Siddique hit a 22-year-old man in the leg, sending him to the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) ward of the Bhabha Hospital in Bandra West.

22-year-old shot in leg during firing at Baba Siddique

Raj Kanojia, who works as a tailor, was at the spot where NCP leader Baba Siddique was shot dead. He had gone to a temple at Khernagar in Bandra East with friends, a five-minute walk from his house, to watch the Durga visarjan on the concluding day of the Hindu festival of Dussehra. Although the bullet has since then been removed from Kanojia’s calf; his family is anxiously waiting for his recovery.

According to Kanojia’s father, Matafer, 45, and uncle Shivdayal, 39, Kanojia was a bystander who was caught in the firing. Matafer, who runs an ironing shop said that Raj had left his house in Nirmal Nagar at 8.30pm on Saturday with two of his friends. “I received a call at 9.30pm from his friend that Raj was shot and was rushed to the hospital by the police,” said Matafer.

On asking about the incident, eyewitnesses told Matafer that when the assailants fired the shots, they assumed that the firecrackers were going off. “When Raj was hit, he saw his leg bleeding and told his friends that the firecracker had injured him. He then ran with the injured leg along with the crowd, about 50 meters from the spot, and sat near the temple,” he said.

After a few minutes, the policemen who came running towards Raj, saw him bleeding and rushed him to the Bhabha hospital. “The doctors have said that Raj would require complete rest for more than a month,” said his uncle Shivdayal.

Kanojia, a Bachelor of Arts (BA) graduate from Uttar Pradesh, has been staying with his father and uncle for the past 20 years.