JOIN USA 19-year-old biker, who was performing stunts near Windsor Lane here was killed, while another was injured when a bullet fired by the police in an attempt to puncture the tyre of the two-wheeler accidently hit them.
The incident took place in the early hours of Sunday in front of Windsor Place near Parliament Street when Karan Pandey and Puneet Sharma, both 19 years, were performing stunts on a bike along with 35 to 40 other bikers. Karan died in the incident, while Puneet Sharma suffered injuries.
“The police fired at the biker after giving several warnings. They fired aiming at the tyre but the bullet accidently hit the pillion rider,” said Rajan Bhagat, Delhi Police spokesperson.
Explaining the sequence of events that led to the “accident”, a senior police officer said: “We received a call about some bikers creating nuisance around the India Gate area at 1:25 am at the police control room (PCR). All PCR vans in the area were alerted. The second call regarding the same was made by our PCR van Victor-60 at 2:07 am.”
The police officers in the PCR vans asked bikers to stop but to no avail. The police made repeated announcements over the loudspeaker but they continued performing stunts.
Furthermore, the bikers started pelting stones at the police and at the PCR vans.
To stop them from throwing stones and bricks, the inspector in charge of the PCR van Sanjeev Parmar fired two bullets in the air. The bikers did not stop and continued performing wheelie in front of Imperial Hotel and kept pelting stones.
The police officer fired a shot towards Puneet’s bike to deflate the tyre. But as the biker was doing a wheelie, the bullet hit Karan, who was the pillion. It pierced through Karan and brushed past Puneet, said the officer. Seeing the bullet fired at one of the bikes, the other bikers fled away from the spot and so did Puneet.
After a few seconds, the PCR van that was attacked started following them and noticed that one of the bikers had fallen.They took him to nearby Ram Manohar Lohia (RML) Hospital, where Karan was declared dead upon arrival while Puneet was admitted, the officer added.
However, victim’s relatives call it police brutality. Karan, who is a school dropout, was living with his mother in south Delhi’s Khirki Extension.“Police have killed my son, he has not done anything wrong,” said Manju Pandey, Karan’s mother
“A case under sections of rioting, damage to public property and obstructing a public servant from performing duty has been registered against the bikers at Mandir Marg police station,” said the officer.