Haryana Class 12 student mistaken for a cow smuggler, chased for 30 km and shot dead

A Class 12 student from Haryana’s Faridabad was allegedly chased down in a car by a group of people who mistook him for a cattle smuggler. The incident took place on Aug 23 and five people of the group, which claims to be cow vigilante, have been arrested, police said. The accused are identified as Anil Kaushik, Varun, Krishna, Adesh and Saurabh.

The group mistook the victim, Aryan Mishra and his friends, Shanky and Harshit, for cattle smugglers and chased their car for about 30 kilometres near Haryana’s Gadhpuri on the Delhi- Agra National Highway.

The group had received information that cattle smugglers were roaming in the city in Renault Duster and Toyota Fortuner cars, picking up cattle. After this, the cow vigilante group decided to teach the alleged cow smugglers a lesson.

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The accused saw a Dustercar at Patel Chowk while he was looking for the cattle smugglers and asked the car driver, Harshit, to stop. However, Aryan and his friends didn’t stop their car and kept driving. Shanky, one of Aryan’s friends had some rivalry with some other group of people and he thought they had sent goons to attack them.

As they didn’t stop the car, the accused opened fire at the car and a bullet hit Aryan, who was in the passenger seat, near the neck. He was shot again when the car finally stopped and the accused thought they might fire back at them.

The accused also saw two women in the car and realised they might have shot the wrong person and fled, as per sources.

Aryan was rushed to a nearby hospital where he died a day later.

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The weapon used to attack Aryan was also illegal, per sources. The accused are currently in police custody and further investigation is underway.

A few days back, a similar story came into the picture when a 23-year-old migrant worker from Bengal was allegedly lynched in Haryana by a cow vigilante group over suspicion of eating beef.

Cow vigilantism is a sensitive issue in India, in the past, many such incidents have also led to violence and riots between groups and communities.

(With inputs from agencies)