Road rage: Dalit youths beaten with belts in public view in UP`s capital Lucknow

Lucknow: Two Dalit youths were beaten with belts in full public view in an incident caused by road rage.The youths were beaten up, abused with casteist slurs when their bike hit another one coming from the opposite direction, resulting in a verbal spat. Those named in the case have been identified as Akash Yadav and Shivam Yadav. According to police reports, the victim Raj Rawat, along with his relative Shiva Rawat, was going for some work on a bike when the incident took place.

The accused Akash Yadav began abusing Raj Rawat which the latter opposed and this further infuriated the accused who untied his belt and started beating Raj while hurling casteist aspersions on him, said the victim in his FIR to the police.

The victim`s brother Anand Rawat, who lodged a case, said Akash also beat up Shiva Rawat for intervening into the brawl. He said another accused Shivam later phoned Raj and threatened him with dire consequences for reporting the matter to police.

DCP North Zone, Qasim Abidi, said that prima facie it has come to fore that the accused and victims were not acquainted with each other in the past nor had an enmity. "An FIR under the charges of prevention of atrocities against ST/SC act and probe is underway," he said.