Drunken driving leads to another street brawl Gurdeep Singh Mann

Gurdeep Singh Mann

Tribune News Service

Bathinda, December 6

After stoning of a man to death, firing of gun shots that left a youth seriously injured, now a city jeweller has become a victim of the unchecked consumption of alcohol by the roadside and drunken driving. Surprisingly, all these three serious crimes took place in the city within the last one week but still, the police seem to have failed to take any action.

This time, Dravjit Merry, owner of Merry Jewellers in the Dhobi Bazaar became the victim of the drunken driving and was allegedly mercilessly beaten up by a group of seven drunkards in the heart of city near Mall Road on Thursday night.

“It was around 10 pm, I left the Civil Lines Club in my car. Suddenly, a white-coloured Maruti Esteem was about to hit my car. I avoided the accident by reducing my car’s speed but to no avail,” Dravjit said.

He pointed out that though he avoided the hit, the car driver continued to veer alternately to the left and right. “Suspecting it to be a clear-cut case of drunken driving, I forced the wrongly driven vehicle to stop near the Taxi Stand on the Mall Road so that it should not hit anybody else on the road. But to my utter surprise, instead of admitting the mistake, the car driver entered into heated arguments with me and started abusing,” Merry said, adding a group of six to seven more persons supporting the driver beat him up. Merry was finally separated from the attackers by some roadside vendors and few passerbys.

The jeweller complained that the assailants took away his two gold chains, which were worth nearly Rs 1.25 lakh. The matter was brought to the notice of the policemen and two men on a PCR bike reached the spot but failed to initiate any action against the accused.

Despite repeated requests and making rounds of the police station, nothing has been done so far to register a case or arrest the accused who have been identified as taxi drivers and owners at the local taxi stand.

ASI Jaswant Singh from the Kotwali police station who is investigating the matter said that since the accused—identified as a taxi driver—was away to Ganganagar yesterday and has now gone to Haridwar, the issue is not yet clear.

“Since both the parties were not together at the police station, we are yet to verify the allegations. The accused says the victim has taken away one and only of his gold chain,” he said. Interestingly, even after 72 hours, the ASI stated that he was not aware of the fact as to what led to the brawl between both the parties.