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Haryana Class 12 student mistaken for a cow smuggler, chased and shot dead
Accused believed the student group was smuggling cow. Police say the crime happened due to case of mistaken identity
A class-12 student named Aryan Mishra from Haryana's Faridabad was chased and shot dead by members of a cow vigilante group on August 23 near Haryana's Gadhpuri.
The incident occurred along the Delhi-Agra highway where the accused chased the victim's car for almost 30 km. The members of vigilante group have been identified as Anil Kaushik, Varun, Krishna, Adesh, and Saurabh, reported NDTV.
Police sources claimed that the weapon used to kill the victim was also illegal. All the accused are under police custody and further investigation into the case is underway.
Also read | Rahul Gandhi blasts Modi govt after attacks on Muslims over beef suspicion: ‘We will not tolerate’
How the crime happened?
The vigilantes received information that cattle ‘smugglers’ were leaving the city in Renault Duster and Toyota Fortuner after picking up cattle in the area.
While on the lookout for ‘smugglers’, the group spotted a Duster car at Patel Chowk in which the victim was travelling along with his friends, Shanky and Harshit.
The vigilantes asked them to stop the car, Aryan and his friends did not stop, as they believed they are being chased by a gang with whom Shanky had a rivalry. The group of friends believed Shanky's rivals were pursuing to kill them.
As the car did not stop, the vigilantes opened fire from the back and a bullet hit Aryan near the neck. The accused shot Aryan again when the car stopped as they suspected that victim's friends might retaliate. The second bullet hit Aryan in the chest. Later, they saw two women inside the car and fled after realising that they had shot the wrong person. Aryan was rushed to a nearby hospital, but he died a day later.
Also read | Haryana CM says migrant worker's murder over suspicion of eating beef not 'mob lynching': ‘Who can stop them?’
Dadri mob lynching case
Meanwhile, Haryana police arrested the eighth accused on Sunday in connection with a lynching in Haryana's Dadri, where a migrant worker from West Bengal was beaten to death on suspicion that he had eaten beef.
Reacting to the case, Jamiat Ulema-e-Hind said the "mob lynching" could have been a planned one to communalise the atmosphere ahead of assembly polls in the state. "Just condemning it is not enough... this mob violence has proved how communal elements consider themselves above the law and are taking the law in their own hands and targeting a particular community on the basis of religion with cruelty," Jamiat chief Maulana Arshad Madani said.
