Taxi driver’s murder: Delhi court sends accused to judicial custody

The 43-year-old cab driver was killed while resisting carjacking in Delhi as the accused had dragged him under the car for around 200 metres, leading to his death.

New Delhi: A Delhi court on Wednesday sent two people, arrested for the murder of a taxi driver, to judicial custody. The 43-year-old cab driver was killed while resisting carjacking in Delhi as the accused had dragged him under the car for around 200 metres, leading to his death.

The accused — Mehraj Salmani (33) and Asif (24), both residents of Uttar Pradesh’s Meerut, were produced before the Metropolitan Magistrate Animesh Bhaskar Mani Tripathi of the Patiala House Courts on expiry of their five-day police custody.

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The court was informed that their further custody was not needed by the police and the counsel urged for them to be sent to jail. On October 13, the police had sought the duo’s remand for seven days on the grounds that they needed to recreate the scene of the crime and for the proper investigation of the case. “Visits have to be made to Meerut and other places in Delhi to prepare the pointing out memo and recovery of case property,” the court was told. The judge was told that the thorough investigation and collection of evidence in the case was yet to be done.

The accused were arrested from Meerut in Uttar Pradesh. The taxi driver, identified as Bijendra, a resident of Faridabad, was found dead near the service road of National Highway-8 in Delhi late on Tuesday. A purported video capturing the incident went viral on social media, showing a man being dragged under a car. In the video, the man could be seen trapped between the rear and front wheels on the right side of the vehicle.

“A case under Sections 302 and 201 of the Indian Penal Code was registered and a probe was initiated,” an official had said. During the initial questioning, the duo had revealed that they boarded the taxi as passengers and after some time threatened and pushed the taxi driver out of the car with the intent to steal the vehicle.