Zeenews Bureau
Melbourne: External Affairs Minister SM Krishna on Monday justified the retaliatory attack by a group of Indians on two Australians who allegedly abused them.
Addressing reporters here, Krishna said though he wouldn’t recommend Indians taking law in their own hands, the attack in question had occurred after the Indians were abused and the right of self-defence could not be denied to them.
Krishna sought to pat his back when he said that incidents of attacks against Indians had come down since his visit to that country in August. “But I will take up the matter with Australia. Our embassy has been asked to coordinate efforts,” he said.
Two locals, who allegedly abused a group of Indians and vandalised their car, were bashed up by them here, police said on Monday.
The incident took place at a carpark outside Meadowglen International Athletics Stadium in Epping when a local skateboarder damaged the rear window of a car belonging to an Indian.
The skateboarder also used the abusive language against some Indians who were coming of the stadium where a Kabaddi match had ended last night.
"Associates of the people, whose car was damaged, came to their assistance. Two men were assaulted and hit with sticks in the brawl. These two injured men were from the group outside who had allegedly started to verbally abuse the people from the vehicle," police said in a statement.
The two men, aged 25 and 42, were taken to Northern Hospital with minor injuries, they said. However, no arrests have been made and the incident was under investigations, police said.
"A lot of people were leaving, the presentations were on at the time, I spoke to one of the boys that was there and he said a guy had smashed the rear window of a car that was leaving," Councillor from the City of Darebin Tim Singh, who was present at the medal presentations ceremony for Kabaddi tournament, was quoted as saying by the media.
Singh said that the guy also made some racial comment following which the clash broke out between the two groups.
Meanwhile, an AAP report quoted police officer Mark Doney as saying that the incident occurred when contestants of the team began to leave the venue.
"One of the youths there tried to get in the way of the cars and yelled out a bit of abuse at people. I think he got his just desserts by the occupants of the vehicle after he smashed the window of their car. Obviously, push has come to shove and he smashed the panel of the side window of the car with the skateboard. It has escalated from there as some of his mates have come down the skatepark. A couple more were assaulted," he said.
Inspector Doney said the injured men hadn't pressed charges.
"We don't have a complaint of assault from them," he said.
First Published: Monday, October 05, 2009, 20:35