Varanasi boy's family yet to get post-mortem report

Varanasi: When 8-year-old Mohammad Sageer stepped out of his home to play with friends on December 20, little did his family know that it would be the last time they would see him.

Sageer was killed in a stampede that ensued when police started lathi-charging people agitating against the Citizenship Act in Varanasi's Bajardiha. He was caught in the crowd that ran amok while trying to escape the police lathis.

"He was playing right outside the home with his cycle. We have no idea when he went to the main road," his grandmother Shehnaz Akhtar said.

At around 6 pm that day, when Akhtar went out to call Sageer back home, she realised he was nowhere around. That's when panic struck, Akhtar said.

Sageer's father, Mohammad Vakil, said he only found out about the incident after he returned home from work at 9.30 pm.

"Someone showed me a picture on their phone of my son lying on the ground. That's when I rushed to the (Banaras Hindu University) trauma centre," he said. But when he reached there, the doctors told him Sageer had died. The family is awaiting Sageer's post-mortem report.