Budaun: Six-year-old Ahaan Pratap’s tiny, bloodied sandals lie on the terrace of his house in Budaun’s Baba colony. The dark bloodstains hide the blue colour of the sandals. On their side is a blood-stained locket and chain, presumably of his alleged murderer, Sajid.
On Tuesday evening, Sajid, along with his brother, Javed, allegedly slit the throats of Ahaan and his 13-year-old brother, Ayush, with a knife. The victims’ brother, Piyush (8), managed to run downstairs and warn their mother. Within three hours, police gunned down Sajid, the main accused, in an alleged encounter in Budaun’s Sheikhupura area. Javed is absconding.
The motive behind the crime remains unclear. According to the victims’ family, Sajid came to their house asking for Rs 5,000 for his wife’s delivery. They had known the accused for years. Sajid and Javed ran a salon in their colony and lived some 12 km away in Sakhunu.
However, according to Sajid’s family, his wife isn’t pregnant. In four years of marriage, the couple had gone through four miscarriages, the family claimed.
“Sajid’s wife Sana has had four miscarriages. Sometimes, she lost the baby at four months, and sometimes, at three months. Over the last four years, Sajid has grown quieter and kept mostly to himself. He was disturbed,” said his 80-year-old grandmother, Puttan.
Asked whether issues in Sajid’s personal life could have made him commit the crime, SSP (Budaun) Alok Priyadarshi said, “We are looking for all possible angles and motives.”
“The FIR says that he (Sajid) asked for Rs 5,000. The motive is unclear currently. Only once Javed is arrested will things be clearer,” he added.
Inspector General (Bareilly range) Rakesh Singh said no past criminal records of Sajid and Javed have come to light, so far. “We are still looking into the records,” the IG added.
On Wednesday, the victims’ house still had signs of the tragedy. There was blood on the terrace, and the walls on all three floors leading up to the terrace had bloodied prints of palms and fingers.
Downstairs, Sangeeta Devi, the boys’ mother, kept losing consciousness. The father, Vinod Kumar, held her in his arms and tried to soothe her. Sangeeta runs a beauty parlour on the house’s first floor, and Vinod works as a contractor.
Piyush, the eyewitness to his brothers’ murders, stared blankly at people around him. He occasionally rubbed his mother’s forehead but wouldn’t say anything. The accused had allegedly tried to catch Piyush, too, but he freed himself. His finger was hurt in the struggle, but he managed to warn Sangeeta about what had happened.
‘Sajid must have done it alone’
The family said Sajid came to their house at 6.45 pm, asking for Rs 5,000 for his wife’s delivery at 11 pm. “When he came, I was in the kitchen. I went to make tea for him. He told me he needed the money urgently, so I called my husband,” said Sangeeta.
Sajid allegedly told Sangeeta that he was feeling unwell and wanted to go to the terrace. “He (Sajid) took two of my sons to the terrace. I went inside to get him the cash. Piyush came running downstairs and told me not to go to the terrace. Then Sajid and Javed came downstairs, blood-soaked. Sajid told me that his work was done,” said Sangeeta.
According to the FIR, Javed initially stood outside the house with his motorcycle. Javed’s family said he had married a year ago and was not involved in the crime.
His grandmother, Puttan, said, “He did nothing. His name has come up because of Sajid… Sajid must have done it alone. Javed was home till 3 pm and left after getting a call.”
Initially, only Sajid’s name had surfaced in the matter. However, the FIR was lodged based on Vinod Kumar’s complaint, which mentioned Javed as an accused.
The FIR said Javed entered the house when Piyush went out to get medicines for Sajid. Sajid had asked Piyush to fetch medicine and Ayush a glass of water and initially took only Ahaan upstairs with him, said the victims’ family.
Police, initially, said “personal rivalry” and a dispute involving Rs 5,000 were behind the murders, but Vinod and Sangeeta have denied this.
“We had no dispute with them. We have known them for years. This is misleading. We don’t know why they killed our sons and if someone asked them to do so,” Vinod said.
“Our boys would go to their (Sajid and Javed’s) shop for haircuts regularly. We don’t know why they killed our boys. We had no rivalry,” Vinod said.
After the murders became public, local residents set everything in the salon that the accused had rented on fire.
A questionable encounter
Police said Sajid pulled the trigger at police teams that were trying to nab him. In retaliation, the police shot him dead. While the murder weapon was a knife, police claimed Sajid had a desi katta on him. Questions arise on the nature of this “encounter” and the sequence of events that led up to it.
Both Baba colony and Sakhunu have turned into fortresses with heavy police presence since the murders. The accused’s father and uncle have been detained since for questioning. Sajid’s body was brought to his house after the alleged encounter.
Neighbours of the accused’s family gave contradictory statements.
“They (the victims’ family and the accused) had a personal tiff going on, but we don’t know what it was about. It must have been over money,” one neighbour said.
Another neighbour, however, dismissed this point, saying, “There was no rift between them. If there was some rivalry, why would they (the victims’ family) welcome them (the accused) to their house?”
They, however, agreed that Sajid was a man of a few words. “He wouldn’t talk much. Every day, the brothers would leave for work around 10 am,” said a neighbour.
While some said immediate justice had been served, others questioned how the police encountered Sajid.
A demand for the accused’s house to be razed by a bulldozer could be heard in both Baba colony and Sakhunu.
(Edited by Madhurita Goswami)
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