Delhi: 44-year-old property dealer shot dead in road rage near Bhalswa Dairy

The victim’s nephew Kunal, who was the sole eyewitness of the murder, told the police that his uncle was driving the Wagon R car when a rashly driven Eeco hit them.

New Delhi

Relatives of property dealer Vinod Mehra mourn his death. Mehra, a resident of Geeta Colony in east Delhi, was returning home with his 15-year-old nephew Kunal after attending a wedding in Alipur when the incident took place. (Sonu Mehta/HT PHOTO)

A 44-year-old property dealer was shot dead allegedly by four men in an apparent case of road rage at a flyover in northwest Delhi’s Bhalswa Dairy on Tuesday morning.

The incident took place when Vinod Mehra, a resident of Geeta Colony in east Delhi, was returning home with his 15-year-old nephew, Kunal, after attending a wedding in Alipur. Police said an argument broke out between Mehra and the four men, travelling in a Maruti Eeco van, after the property dealer objected to them driving rashly.

Fifteen-year-old Kunal, who was the sole eyewitness of the murder, told police that a rashly driven Eeco van had grazed his uncle’s vehicle before the incident. “Mehra rolled down his car’s window and asked the driver to be careful and drove on,” a police officer probing with the case said.

The men, however, chased Mehra’s car for more than two kilometers on GT Karnal Road and intercepted it on Bhalswa Dairy flyway.

One of the two men claimed that the third man in their van was a ‘sharp shooter’ and would kill Mehra. An altercation then broke out after which a third man came out of the van and allegedly pointed a pistol at Mehra.

“Kunal then intervened and tried to snatch the gun from the man. In the ensuing scuffle, the gun went off and a bullet hit my husband in the chest,” Mehra’s wife Santosh Chauhan, a sub-inspector in Delhi Police, said. She added that the attackers then fled.

Ten minutes after the men had fled, Kunal’s tutor — who was also returning with her husband from the same wedding— nooticed Mehra and stopped their car. They immediately put Mehra in their car and drove to Sant Parmanand Hospital where he was declared brought dead, the police said.

Aslam Khan, deputy commissioner of police (northwest), said a case of murder and criminal conspiracy has been registered and investigations are underway. “We have some clues about the suspects. They will be nabbed soon,” she said.

Mehra’s body was handed over to the family after an autopsy at Babu Jagjivan Ram (BJRM) hospital.

“The bullet was fired from a countrymade pistol. It punctured Mehra’s heart and also damaged his liver,” said LC Gupta, head of forensic department, of BJRM.