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Car mows down engineer, injures caretaker in Indore residential complex; 2 held
Engineer killed after car rams into residents amid dispute over penthouse rental in Indore housing complex; CCTV footage under probe.
A 38-year-old software engineer was killed and a caretaker injured when a speeding car hit them in the parking lot of an upscale residential complex in Madhya Pradesh’s Indore on Wednesday night, following a fight between residents and the car owner’s family, police said.Police have arrested Mohit Chaudhary and his father Kuldeep Chaudhary on Thursday after a video of the incident, in which Mohit could be seen hitting a woman caretaker and Shampa Pathak with his car, was widely shared on social media.
Pandey, a software engineer working with Infosys, died at Bombay Hospital, police said.
A fight broke out between residents of Shiv Vatika Township’s Sagarshree Enclave building and the car owner’s family over renting a penthouse to an online rental company.
“The incident occurred on Wednesday night at 10:30 pm at Shiv Vatika Township, located on MR-11. Kuldeep Chaudhary, a resident of the township’s Sagarshree Enclave building, had rented out his penthouse through an online portal. The local residents were objecting to guests arriving on a daily basis and sometimes late in the night,” Lasudiya town inspector Tarnesh Soni said.
“Last night, the residents switched off the electricity to his penthouse. Upon seeing this, Kuldeep Chaudhary came downstairs. In retaliation, he switched off the power to the residents’ flats. This led to a physical altercation. Kuldeep called his son Mohit. He arrived in a car. He first hit a female staff caretaker and then rammed into Shampa Pandey,” said the police officer.
The deceased’s husband, Saurabh Pandey, said the family had shifted to the building on March 13 with their two children and had stepped out to see what was happening. “We heard some noise, so we came down to see what was happening in the parking area. We saw a physical altercation. Amid the chaos, the penthouse owner’s son arrived in a car and hit my wife and a female staffer. He tried to hit me too, but I managed to narrowly escape,” he said.
Residents alleged that the penthouse was not part of the original building plan but was added later. They said they had complained to the builder about late-night arrivals at the penthouse, but no action was taken.
Gaurav Naik, the society president, said close to 3,000 people live in the township and that the penthouse was illegally built.
Soni said police have seized the CCTV footage, which recorded the entire incident, and are investigating the case.
