new delhi: Pappi Devi felt only what a mother could have felt when she noticed that her seven-year-old child was missing. Desperately trying to find her son, a pregnant Devi along with her husband tried looking for help on Thursday night from strangers around the Okhla Industrial Area.
Moments later, however, when they stopped to ask for help from a couple of intoxicated men along the street, the two — irritated with Devi and her husband's questions — beat the husband to death with an iron rod and injured Devi before fleeing. Delhi Police on Friday said they had arrested two brothers in the case and that both of them were Gramin Sewa drivers.
Police said that on the intervening night of August 27 and 28, staffers from the Okhla Industrial Area police station were on patrolling duty and found Devi crying and nervous near the Honda Showroom Chowk. Officials said she was not in a state to tell the police what had happened.
"A male was also lying on the road in an injured condition in a pool of blood. In the meantime, public persons also gathered there. Police staff immediately rushed the injured to ESI Hospital for treatment," police said.
The police here said that they eventually recorded Devi's statement, in which she said that she was from Jaipur and that her husband Krishan Kumar Meena (40) was a truck driver. She then went on to tell police that the two men were standing near the Honda Chowk on Maa Anand Mai Marg and when they went to ask for help in looking for their missing child, they got irritated. Significantly, she described the accused to the police.
"When her husband asked about his missing child from those two persons standing near Honda Chowk Maa Anand Mai Marg, they got irritated and assaulted her husband with an iron rod. When she shouted for help, both the assailants ran away from there leaving behind her husband in a pool of blood," Deputy Commissioner of Police (South East) RP Meena said.
DCP Meena said that during their investigation, one security guard had shared an important lead about a man with a brown-coloured shirt who he had seen running away from the crime scene. The security guard added that the man often slept in parked Gramin Sewas on the road.
"On the basis of the clue given by the security guard, one person was apprehended who was sleeping at the place revealed by him. This person was identified as Rakesh Arora. On his instance another accused Dheeraj Arora was nabbed," the DCP said.
Eventually, PCR staff traced Devi's child in Pul Prahladpur and brought the mother and child together.
Both the accused were drivers of Gramin Sewa operating in the Okhla Industrial Area. On the intervening night of August 27-28, both of them were drinking in Gramin Sewas parked at the main road and were talking to each other. And this was when Devi and Meena came to them, desperately looking for help.
He was asking for help repeatedly from the siblings which purportedly "disturbed them". In this melee, Dheeraj caught hold of Meena and Rakesh Arora pulled out an iron rod from a parked Gramin Sewa and hit him on his head. When Meena's wife started to shout for help, both of them fled.