A court here Tuesday sent three youths to two days' police custody for killing a Manipuri man, after officials informed the court that custodial interrogation of the accused was required for tracing two other accused who were on the run.
Akha Salouni, a 29-year-old Manipuri BPO employee, was assaulted around 1 a.m. Monday following a spat with the assailants while he was going to a friend's house in Kotla Mubarakpur area in south Delhi to spend the night.
Metropolitan Magistrate Ashok Kumar sent Sanjay Basoya, 24, Shakti Basoya, 21, and Rajiv, 25, to police custody till July 24.
They were arrested on charges of attacking Salouni and beating him to death.
Police said all three belong to Garhi area in south Delhi but were picked up from various places in the capital.
Police told the court Tuesday that the other accused in the case - Bhola and Lokesh - were on the run and custodial interrogation of the three arrested accused will help in tracing them.
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The accused were booked on charges of murder and under the SC/ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act.
According to the first information report (FIR) which was accessed by IANS, Salouni and two of his friends - Nagendra Sharma and Dihe Kazhihrii - were coming from Masoorpur in Vasant Kunj in an auto-rickshaw.
"As they entered Kotla Mubarakpur, they came across a white coloured Hyundai Verna, which stopped on seeing the auto-rickshaw," said the FIR filed by Kazhihrii, who hails from Nagaland.
According to the report, five-six men aged between 25-30 got down from the car and started shouting "maro maro", following which they surrounded Akha Salouni and beat him up.
"Watching one of the five men attacking Salaouni, approaching towards Kazhihrii and Nagendra, the two fled the spot," said the FIR.
Kazhihrii, who ran towards his house in Kotla Mubarakpur, later made a call to the police control room (PCR) van around 2 a.m.
"Later, when the two returned to the spot, they found that Salouni was lying unconscious and within a few minutes he was dead," the report said.
Police, who arrived around 2.50 a.m., took Salouni to a hospital where he was declared dead on arrival.
However, the statements of the three accused gave a different version of the incident.
As per police, the accused said they were travelling in a white Hyundai Verna car, and when they came across the auto-rickshaw, they blew the horn and sought the right to overtake.
"However, the auto-rickshaw didn't give them any space to overtake, and instead the three people travelling in it used abusive language against them," the accused claimed during their interrogation.
The five people in the car later intercepted the auto-rickshaw, got down from the car and were involved in an argument with them.
The attack sparked outrage among the northeastern community, and evoked concern from members of the Rajya Sabha Tuesday.