A 40-year-old Delhi police Head Constable was shot dead by unknown assailants in south-east Delhi’s Jaitpur on Tuesday night.
The police suspect that officer Ramavatar Meena, who was not in his uniform, noticed some suspicious activity in the area and was shot at from close range when he tried to intervene.
“We received a call at 11.30 p.m. from Jaitpur about an injured policeman being taken to Apollo hospital. A police team reached the hospital where doctors informed them that the man was declared brought dead,” said DCP (South-East) Chinmoy Biswal. Ramavatar had suffered a bullet injury below his right ribs.
The Head Constable was posted at Ambedkar Nagar police station and used to resided in Jaitpur.
The police said that on Tuesday, Ramavatar reached home around 9.30 p.m. after finishing his duty.
After changing his uniform, he went to the flour mill where he was told to collect the flour in an hour. The head constable then went home.
“Ramavatar left his residence around 11 p.m. to collect the flour from a shop around 200 metres from his home. On his way, he was shot at by unknown persons. His motorcycle was found parked on the side and the keys were in his pockets. One of the locals spotted him and made a PCR call at 11.30 p.m. and rushed him to the hospital where he was declared dead on arrival,” said Mr. Biswal.
More than 20 people have been rounded up to gather information in the case, the officer said.
“The postmortem was conducted at the AIIMS. The body was handed over to his family members,” said Mr. Biswal. “An FIR under IPC Section 302 (murder) has been registered at Jaitpur police station. It could be a case of personal enmity,” said the officer.
Those who came to attend the deceased’s funeral said that he was an alert policeman irrespective of his duty hours.
Appreciation certificate
He was recently awarded an appreciation certificate and a cash reward for performing meritorious job. Ramavatar is survived by his wife and two children aged 10 and 6. His elder brother also works with the Delhi police.
In the last two months, Ramavatar had arrested around eight proclaimed offenders and contributed to investigations in several important cases, said the police
“On September 5, he celebrated his son’s 6th birthday and invited many people. He was one of the best policeman I had worked with,” said a colleague of the deceased.
