Dimapur, December 15 (MExN): The unremitting trend of vehicle-lifting in Dimapur added another victim today evening, when a vehicle belonging to a theologian and also former executive member of the Dimapur Naga Students’ Union, was “snatched” at gunpoint by a group of gunmen, at the Chathe River Bridge. The crime took place at the bridge itself, near the Referral Hospital, Dimapur at around 6:30 PM.
In the course of the crime, the victims on anonymity said, the armed men also fired a shot but there were no fatalities. According to the victims, they were three of a family in the vehicle – a red Maruti 800 bearing the registration number NL 07 4869 with engine number 3699689 and Chassis number 2615908. The three – said to be residents of Padum Pukhri – were returning home after a domestic errand and were scheduled to leave for Lakhuti village in Wokha, for the car-owner’s sister’s wedding. The victims said they had stopped at the bridge to relieve themselves when about five to six armed persons approached the car and started demanding who the owner of the vehicle was. The actual number of the gunmen could not be ascertained as it was already dark, the victims said.
Then the armed miscreants, who claimed to be Naga underground activists, separated the three victims. The actual owner, a theologian currently in Christian ministry and also a former DNSU leader, was taken down under the bridge. There, he was threatened by the gunmen against raising any alarm or else “Guli khabo”. After being questioned and threatened, the owner was told to go but when he refused to leave, the gunmen fired a shot near his feet. The gunmen even demanded a “deposit” of Rs. 1 Lakh if the owner wanted his vehicle returned.
The miscreants also made off with all the original documents of the car, mobile phones and cash amount of several thousand rupees meant for the car-owner’s sister, who is scheduled to be married on December 17. The victims walked home all the way from the Chathe River Bridge and filed a FIR (First Information Report) with the Dimapur East Police Station.
