College student attacks bus conductor with cleaver, boasts punishment for ‘abusing a Muslim’

The incident took place Friday when one Lareb Hashmi took a cleaver to bus conductor Hrikesh sending him to hospital with serious wounds.

Prayagraj: An engineering student allegedly attacked a bus conductor on his neck with a cleaver and later went on to boast in a video that this was his punishment for “abusing a Muslim,” police here said on Sunday.

The incident took place Friday when one Lareb Hashmi took a cleaver to bus conductor Hrikesh sending him to hospital with serious wounds.

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Hashmi was nabbed the same day later from Chandi village after a gunfire encounter with police during which he was shot in leg, an officer said. “Police have secured custody remand of the accused for further questioning,” said Assistant Commissioner of Police Ajit Singh Chauhan.

The incident came into light when a video shot by Hashmi went viral on the social media.  “He was abusing a Muslim. Insha Allah he will not survive,” Hashmi says in the video referring to the bus conductor.

“Nobody should think that the government is of Modi and Yogi. Only Mustafa rules our hearts. Allah hu Akbar, Allah hu Akbar,” he said. Hashmi in the video also shows the cleaver with which he attacked the conductor.

When interrogated in the hospital, Hashmi told police that the bus conductor had said rude things to him because of which he attacked him.

Hashmi after his arrest took police to a bush where he had hidden the cleaver. Police recovered a pistol also from there.

The accused, according to police, fired at police first and was shot in leg in retaliation.

Chauhan said that on the complaint of Harikesh’s father Ram Shiromani Vishwakarma, a case under section 307 (attempt to murder) of IPC has been registered against Hashmi. Bus conductor Harikesh is undergoing treatment at SRN Hospital and is now out of danger, he said.