The Hindu : New Delhi News : Bikers storm CP at midnight; 45 held

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, Jul 24, 2007
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New Delhi

New Delhi

Bikers storm CP at midnight; 45 held

Staff Reporter

NEW DELHI: A battery of young motorcycle riders went on the rampage in Connaught Place here in the early hours of Monday, damaging vehicles, injuring policemen and two television journalists. The police have arrested 45 of them on charges of rioting, assault and damaging public property.

It all began around midnight when the young riders zipped through the lanes of Connaught Place at high speed. It is learnt that several of them drove on the wrong carriageway and got into fights with passers-by. Around 2 a.m. when they neared Gole Market, a reporter of a Hindi television news channel, Umesh Gupta, and a cameraman, Irshad, spotted them and started filming them. The motorcyclists overpowered the duo and allegedly thrashed them.

The police, who were deployed in the area as part of arrangements for a Sikh guru’s birth anniversary celebrations on Monday, arrived at the scene and tried to intervene. The riders, however, started hurling stones at them and allegedly damaged some police vehicles.

It took about an hour for the police to disperse the motorcyclists, after which a hunt was launched for those involved. In all, 16 of the accused were arrested by the Connaught Place police and 29 by the Mandir Marg police. They were produced before a local court that sent them to judicial custody.

According to a senior police officer, almost every Saturday night the roads of Connaught Place are turned into race tracks by these young motorcyclists, most of whom come from West Delhi to offer prayers at Gurdwara Bangla Sahib.

“Several of them have been arrested in the past on charges of rash driving,” said the police officer.

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