Outrage intensifies, cops say no racism link found

Outrage over the murder of a 24-year-old Tripura student in an alleged racial attack continued to intensify on Monday with Union ministers and Opposition leaders criticising the incident, even as Uttarakhand police said they had no evidence linking the incident to racism.

- HT Correspondents

As protests continued to rock parts of Tripura, Uttarakhand chief minister Pushkar Singh Dhami spoke to the father of the student and assured strict punishment to the accused.

Anjel Chakma, a resident of Agartala who was pursuing MBA at a private university in Uttarakhand, died from injuries sustained during an attack that occurred in Dehradun on December 9 allegedly after he objected to racial slurs hurled at him and his brother Michael. Anjel died during treatment on December 26, and his postmortem report is awaited. Police said preliminary examination suggested that he received blows to his head and back with a sharp object and a “kadaa’ (bracelet) following a quarrel with five-six people at a canteen.

In his statement to police on December 10, Michael (21) had alleged that the accused were intoxicated at the time of the incident and used racist slurs at him and later stabbed his brother.

On Monday, however, Selaqui police station in-charge PD Bhatt said: “We have found no evidence so far to link the incident with racism. There is no basis for such allegations.” He added that three accused— Manipur resident Suraj Khwas (22), and locals Avinash Negi (25), Sumit (25) —have been arrested, while two minors have been sent to juvenile home. Another accused is likely to have fled to his hometown in Nepal.