Hit-and-run victim ignored and robbed

NEW DELHI: On Wednesday morning, Mohammed Matibool,35, was walking to his house to change clothes before stepping out to ride his e-rickshaw.

NEW DELHI: On Wednesday morning, Mohammed Matibool,35, was walking to his house to change clothes before stepping out to ride his e-rickshaw.

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Matibool worked round the clock.

At night, he was a security guard who slept on a chair inside a garage in Subhash Nagar. Every morning, as was his routine, he hurriedly went to his room in Tihar village to wash and change his clothes.

During the day, he was an e-rickshaw driver, ferrying passengers from the nearby Subhash Nagar Metro station and goods for the local shopkeepers.

At 5.40am, a three-wheeler tempo hit him from behind on the main road opposite Miraj Cinemas in Subhash Nagar— less than 500 metres from his house. He was flung to a pole nearby. The tempo driver is caught on CCTV getting out of the tempo, looking around for a minute, and fleeing the spot.

At 5.45, a PCR van is seen passing by the road. A rickshaw driver who spotted him is seen stealing his cell phone. As motorists turned back to see him on the road, nobody bothered to take him to the hospital.

“There are many liquor shops around. Initially, we thought he was drunk,” said a shopkeeper.

At 6.09 am, one of his friends spotted Matibool and ran home to inform the other friends. The police were informed around 6.50 pm. The CCTV footage shows a PCR van reaching the spot at 6.52 pm.

“Two police teams reached the spot and fought over jurisdiction. Both the SHOs from Hari Nagar and Rajouri Garden refused to take him to hospital. Precious time was lost. He could have been saved,” said Matibool’s friend, Mohammed Majbul.

Matibool was removed from the spot at 9.11 am and declared dead on arrival at the Deen Dayal Upadhyay Hospital.

Deputy commissioner of police (west) Pushpender Kumar denied allegations of police fighting over jurisdiction. “At 6.50 when we received information that a man was lying dead on the ground, our officers reached the spot and saw that he had died. We found no evidence of hit-and-run on the spot,” the DCP said.

Kumar said it took time to remove the body because they were probing the case as a murder.

“We called the forensic crime team. We waited for them at the spot. We cannot remove a body without following the standard operating procedure. Later, when we saw a CCTV near the spot and checked the footage, we learnt it was a hit-and-run case. Unfortunately, he died on the spot,” Kumar said.

Police have registered a case and arrested the driver of the tempo, Rajesh Gupta, 25. Rajesh supplied milk in Tilak Nagar.

Gupta claimed that he was dizzy due to sleep and lost control over the vehicle. Police said they are looking for the rickshaw puller who stole Matibool’s cellphone.