Two civilians were killed and another injured at Tezpur in Assam’s Sonitpur district when an Assam Rifles personnel fired indiscriminately after a drunken brawl on late Sunday night, police said on Monday.
Police on Monday arrested the accused Assam Rifles personnel and interrogation is on regarding the case, police said. locals said that the Assam Rifles personnel came to the house of one Gautam Das, who sells liquor in his house at Patia Chuburi under Tezpur Sadar police station. The Assam Rifles personnel had an altercation with Das after having liquor during the day and left.
“The jawan came again at night to the house of Das accompanied by some of his colleagues and asked for liquor. Initially my father served liquor to them. However, they wanted more liquor and my father refused as it was too late. At this the jawan got angry and fired at my father with his gun,” said one of the sons of Das, who somehow escaped the firing.
While Das died on the spot, his wife Jinu Das received severe bullet injuries, police said adding that another neighbor of Das, Babul Das, who came to the spot after hearing the gun shot also got injured and breathed his last in the hospital. The injured was undergoing treatment at the Tezpur Kanaklata Civil hospital.
“We have registered a case in this regard and arrested the accused Karnail Singh Kapoor today morning. Kapoor admitted that he was in inebriated condition and he had fired around seven rounds from his service gun,” police said. Meanwhile, the Defence authorities have clarified that the firing incident that killed two civilians has no connection with any counter insurgency operational angle in it.