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Car with drunk men hits woman in Delhi’s Sultanpuri, drags her 7km
A 20-year-old woman was killed after a car hit her scooty and dragged her around for nearly seven kilometres in outer Delhi’s Sultanpuri early on Sunday morning, police said.
A 20-year-old woman was killed after a car hit her scooty and dragged her around for nearly seven kilometres in outer Delhi’s Sultanpuri early on Sunday morning, police said. Five men, who were suspected to be under the influence of alcohol at the time of the accident, have been arrested for causing death by negligence, the police said.
The horrific accident prompted the Delhi Commission for Women (DCW) to issue a notice to the Delhi Police in connection with the incident.
The Kanjhawala police station in Rohini district received a distress call at around 3.20am about a body being dragged under a grey-colored Maruti Baleno going towards Qutubgarh, special commissioner of police (law and order, zone 1) Deependra Pathak said.
While the police from Rohini district were still probing the call, another caller informed the police of a woman’s body lying on the Kanjhawala main road at around 4.11am.
“The staff deployed at pickets were alerted as well as the message was flashed to search the vehicle. At 4.11am, information was received in Kanjhawala police station about a woman’s body lying near Shani Bazar in Krishan Vihar. Subsequently, the case was transferred to the Sultanpuri police station,” Pathak said.
A police team was rushed to the spot where they found the woman’s body without clothes and with broken limbs, leading to suspicion that the woman was sexually assaulted and murdered. The police, however, said later that it appeared to be a case of causing death by rash and negligent driving.
“The dead body was taken to Sanjay Gandhi Memorial hospital in Mangolpuri, where it has been preserved at the mortuary,” Pathak said.
The victim was identified as Anjali Kumari, a resident of Aman Vihar, who used to work as a beautician at wedding functions and other such events.
“According to the details available, the woman was returning home from one such event when the accident took place,” he said.
The senior police official said that the woman’s leg got trapped in one of the wheels of the car when it hit her scooty. “As a result, she was dragged for around seven kilometres,” he said.
The car was traced to its owner’s house in Rohini.
“The Baleno car was given as a dowry to another person. This person, who took the car as dowry, told us he owns the car but he lent it to his friend. This is how we traced the driver, Deepak Khanna,” another officer said.
Khanna’s interrogation led the police to other accused. “The accused have been identified as Deepak Khanna (26), Amit Khanna (25), Krishan (27), Mithun (26) and Manoj Mittal (27). While Deepak works as a driver in gramin sewa, Amit works for SBI cards in Uttam Nagar, Krishan works at Connaught Place. While Mithun is a hairdresser in Naraina, Mittal works as a food dealer in Sultanpuri,” Harendra Kumar Singh, the deputy commissioner of police (outer), said.
Deepak borrowed the car at around 8pm on Saturday and picked up his friends, police said. Together, the five drove to Murthal, Haryana, where they ate dinner at a roadside eatery. Police suspect the accused consumed liquor inside their car and left for Mangolpuri in Delhi after midnight.
The police are also probing if the driver, Deepak, was drunk at the time of the accident. “We have also taken the blood sample of Deepak to examine that whether he was under the influence of alcohol or not,” he said.
The accused have told the police that they did not realise that the body was stuck under the bonnet of the car for nearly 15 minutes.
“They told the police that when they got to know about it, they got scared and were driving around in the area. When they reached near the main road and had the fear of being caught, they dislodged the body from the car and fled,” an officer at the Kanjhawala police station said, asking not to be named. One of them told the police that they had the windows rolled up and were playing loud music in the car.
A case under sections 279 (rash driving) and 304-A (causing death by negligence) of the Indian Penal Code has been registered against the accused at the Kanjhawala police station, the DCP said.
The victim’s family, however, has alleged that she was sexually abused.
“It was not at all an accident. What sort of accident is this when there was not even a single cloth on my daughter’s body. We want complete investigation,” her mother, Rekha Devi, said.
“We are sure that those five accused had first sexually assaulted her and then killed. She was the only earning member of her family. We want complete justice in this case and severe punishment for the accused,” the woman’s uncle, Prem Singh, said.
A post-mortem examination of the woman’s body is likely to be conducted on Monday, officials said.
Meanwhile, DCW chairperson Swati Maliwal took cognisance of the matter and issued a summons to the police.
“Her body was found without clothes on the road. This is a very scary incident. I am issuing summons to Delhi Police to appear before the panel. What were the security arrangements on the occasion of New Year?” she tweeted.
Assuring action against the accused, Delhi Lieutenant Governor VK Saxena tweeted, “My head hangs in shame over the inhuman crime in Kanjhawla-Sultanpuri today morning and I am shocked at the monstrous insensitivity of the perpetrators. The accused have been apprehended. All aspects are being thoroughly looked into.”
