‘Encounter’ at Restaurant: Bullet holes in a quiet diner

Shaibu claims he was not present during the firing and it was police who called him after the shooting.

It’s 8 pm Sunday evening. The Sagar Ratna restaurant in old Rajendra Nagar wears a deserted look. At least a dozen customers are sent back. “We are closed,” is the response from the manager.

Sandwiched between an IAS coaching institute and another food joint, Sagar Ratna is positioned at one of the safest locations in the busy market area. Less than 50 meters from it is a police chowki. Above the restaurant, on the second floor, is a parlour.

Twenty-four hours after the “encounter” of Manoj Vashisht inside this restaurant, people who were nearby recollect the firing. Suparna, an employee with the saloon, says, The restaurant is generally full during the weekends, but I had never seen so many people standing outside before. I then heard the firing. I ran towards the entrance and saw one dead body lying on the floor.”

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“It was 8:28 pm. That was when the firing took place”, claims a street vender, who does not want to be named. The vendor, who sells fruit in the proximity of the restaurant saw a glass panel suddenly shatter. From his joint, he points out, “That is the glass which shattered. I heard a noise. Did not know it was due to firing. Only after some time did we come to know it was a police encounter.”

“It was dark. Now we notice that more than one glass panel was damaged due to firing. But we do not know how many rounds of firing took place,” says Shaibu Mathew, manager of this branch of Sagar Ratna. Shaibu claims he was not present during the firing and it was police who called him after the shooting.

Kaunain Sheriff M

Kaunain Sheriff M is an award-winning investigative journalist and the National Health Editor at The Indian Express. He is the author of Johnson & Johnson Files: The Indian Secrets of a Global Giant, an investigation into one of the world’s most powerful pharmaceutical companies. With over a decade of experience, Kaunain brings deep expertise in three areas of investigative journalism: law, health, and data. He currently leads The Indian Express newsroom’s in-depth coverage of health. His work has earned some of the most prestigious honours in journalism, including the Ramnath Goenka Award for Excellence in Journalism, the Society of Publishers in Asia (SOPA) Award, and the Mumbai Press Club’s Red Ink Award. Kaunain has also collaborated on major global investigations. He was part of the Implant Files project with the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ), which exposed malpractices in the medical device industry across the world. He also contributed to an international investigation that uncovered how a Chinese big-data firm was monitoring thousands of prominent Indian individuals and institutions in real time. Over the years, he has reported on several high-profile criminal trials, including the Hashimpura massacre, the 2G spectrum scam, and the coal block allocation case. Within The Indian Express, he has been honoured three times with the Indian Express Excellence Award for his investigations—on the anti-Sikh riots, the Vyapam exam scam, and the abuse of the National Security Act in Uttar Pradesh. ... Read More

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