Team Herald
MAPUSA/PANJIM: In a horrific incident reported in Anjuna in broad daylight, a parking attendant died after being assaulted by tourists as they allegedly refused to pay the parking fee.
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Forty-five-year-old Sagar Shripad Naik, a resident of Anjuna, was performing his duties as attendant at the pay parking near Anjuna Beach.
Anjuna Police said they looked into the matter immediately and arrested five persons in this connection.
The incident was reported by the cousin of the deceased Deepak Shivolkar, who in his police complaint stated that on Friday at around 1 pm, five occupants of a vehicle bearing registration number KA-01-P-7326 with their common intention assaulted the victim with slaps, who sustained severe injuries. The victim fell and sustained head injuries which caused bleeding.
People present at the spot shifted Naik to the nearby private hospital, where the doctor on duty declared him brought dead.
Enraged over the incident, the locals called for the immediate arrests of the accused and explained that the deceased had just asked the tourists to pay their parking fees. The tourists not only refused to do so but chose to escalate the matter and were involved in a heated argument in which one of the accused punched the victim on his face. Trying to defend himself, the victim, who was also irked with the tourists’ behaviour, tried to reach for a stick to fight back but before he could do so, he fell on the ground, as a result of the blows he received and he later sustained a head injury and started bleeding profusely, the locals said.
Soon after the incident, the accused fled from the spot in their vehicle and tried to cross the Goa border on their way back to Karnataka. However, the police had already issued an alert message and the accused were detained at the Polem check post with the help of Canacona Police.
The accused were tracked based on the vehicle number recorded in the CCTV footage. Police later informed all the police stations.
While trying to cross the border, the Canacona police detained the accused based on the vehicle registration number and other details.
Anjuna Police have registered an offence under Section 302 r/w 34 of Indian Penal Code.
PI Suraj Gawas is further investigating the case.
According to sources, three more persons are also being interrogated for their possible involvement in the incident.
Condemning the incident, several political parties expressed their sympathies to the family of the deceased and criticised the State of affairs given that such an incident could even occur.
Just last month, two tourists had assaulted a caretaker of a guesthouse with the country-made pistols. One of them was caught by locals in Calangute while trying to flee and was later arrested.
In another recent incident a tourist tried to hit a shopping attendant after being pulled up for not wearing a mask while entering the shop’s premises.
All these incidents have raised questions about the safety of locals along the coastal belt and the effectiveness of security measures.
