A 50-year-old cloth vendor who was robbed and assaulted by a mob, had his ears cut off and was branded with an iron rod in Nalanda district last week, died during treatment on Friday night, officials said.
Mohammad Athar Hussain, a resident of Gagan Diwan village who sold clothes on a bicycle, died late Friday night at Pawapuri VIMS hospital, where he was undergoing treatment after a mob allegedly accosted him while he was peddling his wares on December 5 and beat him up. Six people have been arrested and two minors detained so far, police said.
According to his brother Mohammad Shakib Alam, Hussain, who also lived partly with his in-laws in Barui village, was returning home when his bicycle broke down near Bhattapar village under Roh police station, forcing him to look for a puncture shop.
“When he asked a group of people about a puncture repair shop nearby, they asked his name and profession and then assaulted him, cut his ears, beat him with a heated rod,” he told The Indian Express.
In a video, Hussain recounted that his assailants first asked his name, then pulled him off his bicycle and robbed him of Rs 18,000. The mob allegedly swelled to 15–20 people.
“They tied my hands and feet, locked me in a room, and began to beat me up. They beat me with bricks and rods, breaking my fingers and hand. They even cut my ears and finger ends with pliers,” he claimed, adding that the mob had “stripped him to check his private parts, branding his body with a heated iron rod that peeled his skin off”.
“Someone struck me with a rod, another climbed on my chest and throttled me, causing blood to gush from my mouth. My entire body was raw and peeling from the assault,” Hussain alleged.
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In her complaint on December 6, his wife Shabnam Parveen named 10 people all residents of Bhattapar village. The remaining 10 are unidentified.
“Villagers from Bhattapar caught my husband on false theft charges, tied him, beat him brutally, branded him with a hot rod, broke his hand, cut his ear with pliers, and tortured him in other ways,” the complaint, cited in the FIR, said.
She also alleged that when she reached Bhattapar with her brothers-in-law, “villagers abused and threatened them too”.
The FIR invokes Sections 190, 191(2) and 191(3) (unlawful assembly and rioting), 126(2), 115(2), 117 and 118 (grievous hurt and use of dangerous means), 109 and 74 (abetment and common intention), and 303(2) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, with murder charges added after Hussain succumbed to his injuries.
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Meanwhile, a cross-complaint by one of the suspects, Sikandar Yadav, accuses Hussain of burglary at around 10.15 pm the same night.
“Gold bangles, mangalsutra, silver girdle, and brass utensils… were stolen from our house,” the complaint claims. “My brother Satyanarayan spotted the thief, and villagers caught him with some recovered items. Hussain struck Satyanarayan with a rod during capture, injuring him.”
According to a police source, an emergency 112 call led Roh police to the village at around 2.30 am to rescue the severely injured Hussain. He and the suspects were then taken to the police station.
Hussain was first taken to PHC Roh, then referred to Nawada Sadar Hospital and finally Pawapuri VIMS, where he died. A post-mortem has been conducted.
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Nawada SP Abhinav Dhiman said: “A special team under the SDPO Sadar arrested four suspects within 24 hours, and four more on December 13. Eight people have been either arrested or detained, and police are conducting raids to trace the rest”.
