Gurgaon: It was coincidence that led to the 16-minute chase, which ended with the killing of 20-year-old student Aryan Mishra in the early hours of Aug 24.
That night, Anil Kaushik, a member of the Faridabad Cow Protection Task Force, and four of his associates were on one of their regular "patrols" to search for cattle smugglers, according to the charge sheet filed in the case earlier this week.
To scare any smugglers they ran into, Anil carried a gun that he told his friends was procured legally. One of the co-accused, Varun carried a toy gun, the charge sheet says.
The five cow vigilantes, in their Swift mounted with a ‘lal-neeli' beacon, were crossing the T-point of Sector 21A and Sector 21D at 2.52am when the driver of a red Duster, apparently on spotting them, reversed the car and turned to go the other way.
In the Duster was a group of five – Aryan Mishra, his landlady Sujata Gulati, her sons Harshit and Sagar (alias Shanky) and another neighbour Kirti Sharma.
According to their statements to police, the group left their house from NIT-5 area of Faridabad around 1.30am to look for a hotel for Shanky. Wanted in an assault case registered in the city on Aug 15, the Gulatis wanted to shield Shanky from getting arrested.
They couldn't find a hotel room available at that time in the night, so it was decided that Shanky would take shelter at their neighbour Kirti Sharma's house in Sector 21D.
"While we were on our way to Kirti aunty's house, a white Swift without a number plate started chasing us. Someone started firing from that vehicle, and fearing that they were police, we started speeding towards Badkhal," Shanky told police.
The chase & the shooting
Anil told investigators his group suspected cows were being smuggled in the Duster, so they followed. The chase, which began from Sector 21D, ended 29km away on the Delhi-Agra highway in Palwal at 3.08am.
"As they turned their car, I fired a round into the air. We chased the Duster via Patel Chowk, Badkhal, and Ankheer towards Palwal. They were driving at a very high speed, and I kept firing at them to stop their vehicle. At Bhagola, their car stopped. I got out of our vehicle and fired a shot at the person sitting in the front seat next to the driver with the intention to kill him," Anil said in his statement quoted in the charge sheet.
The co-passenger in the Duster was Aryan, who was just accompanying his friends that night. Shanky's brother and Aryan's friend Harshit admitted that he drove at 140-150kmph to escape who they thought were police.
"We stopped the car (in Palwal) on realising that Aryan was shot. Harshit and I got off the car screaming for help. And the accused fled after noticing that my mother and Kirti aunty were in the car," Shanky said in his statement.
The case
Faridabad police, in their charge sheet submitted to a local court on Nov 26, named the five cow vigilantes as accused -- Anil Kaushik, Adesh Kumar, Varun, Saurav Sharma and Krishan – in the murder case.
The document also cited the statements of 41 witnesses, including Aryan's co-passengers in the Duster and investigators who probed the case.
After their arrest, the accused lied to police that they disposed of Anil's firearm in Bawana canal at Narela, Delhi. But Anil later told cops he hid the gun in a shoe rack at his house in Faridabad. It was recovered on Aug 31. Investigators also found the toy gun from Varun's house.
TOI reported on Wednesday that police invoked the section for lynching, Section 103(2), which was introduced in India's criminal laws this year as Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS) replaced the Indian Penal Code (IPC).
The other charges against them are criminal conspiracy, intentionally concealing evidence, unlawful assembly, rioting with deadly weapons and illegal possession of a weapon.