A casual labourer was stabbed to death by an alleged bootlegger and his three accomplices inside the trauma care centre of government-run GG Hospital in Jamnagar city in the early hours of Thursday. The police said the incident took place at around 12.30 am on Thursday when the victim, identified as Dharmarajsinh alias Bhuro Zala, 32, was undergoing treatment. According to an FIR lodged at B Division police station in Jamnagar city, Jaypalsinh Chudasama, a local bootlegger and a neighbour of Zala, came to the trauma care centre with his friends Urmil alias Umo Rathod, Pranavdipsinh alias Pancho Vaghela and Akshayrajsinh Parmar. As per the FIR, Chudasama stabbed Zala with a knife after Vaghela grabbed the victim and overpowered him. This was the second assault on the victim by the accused within an hour, the police said. The FIR, lodged on the basis of a complaint filed by Zala’s friend Sukhdevsinh Jadeja, states that Chudasama hit Zala on the head with an iron rod near the gate of police headquarters on Saru Section Road of Jamnagar city at around 11.30 pm on Wednesday. After that assault, Ravirajsinh Parmar, another friend of Zala, rushed the victim to the trauma care centre of GG Hospital. In the meantime, Zala also called Jadeja and informed him that Chudasama had assaulted him and asked Jadeja to meet him at the hospital. “Zala was given treatment in the trauma care centre… However, he succumbed to his wounds after brief treatment,” P P Jha, police inspector in charge of B Division police station of Jamnagar, told The Indian Express. “The reason for this incident (murder) is that this Jaypalsinh Chudasama sells liquor and every time he would be caught by the police, he would suspect that Dharmarajsinh alias Bhuro had tipped (police) about him. Around one-and-a-half months ago, Jaypalsinh had gone to Bhuro’s residence and they had a quarrel. The two had a tiff going on since,” the FIR quotes Jadeja, 42, owner of a brass parts manufacturing unit, as having stated in his complaint. The police inspector said that Zala and Chudasama were friends. “They were not just friends since their childhood but also neighbours,” Jha said, adding, “Zala was undergoing treatment for a mental illness for the past eight months. Chudasama used to tease Zala about it. This led to a scuffle which took a violent turn later on.” Based on Jadeja’s complaint, the police have booked Chudasama, Rathod, Vaghela and Parmar under IPC Sections 302 (murder), 504 (intentional insult with intent to provoke breach of the peace) and 114 (abetter present when offence is committed). “The accused ran away after assaulting Zala for the second time in hospital. Efforts are on to nab them,” said Jha.
