Khyala murder: daughter says parents left to bleed

Day after woman’s death, husband succumbs to injuries; accused arrested

A day after three members of a family were stabbed in west Delhi’s Khyala, the accused was arrested on Thursday morning. The incident left a 35-year-old woman dead on Wednesday while her husband succumbed to injuries at the hospital the next day and son battling for life.

Meanwhile, the daughter of the victims alleged that her parents were left to bleed on the street for over an hour and a half but no one took them to the hospital.

Deputy Commissioner of Police (West) Monika Bhardwaj said that the accused Mohd Saleem*, a resident of Khyala’s JJ colony, was arrested from Zakhira on Thursday morning for allegedly killing Anita* and her husband Ram Pal* (41) and injuring their son Amit* (20) with a chopper.

Fateful day

Recalling the incident, the couple’s 18-year-old daughter Priya*, who is five-month pregnant, said her father, brother and younger siblings – Vidushi* (8) and Raman* (11) – were at home on the fateful day, and the mother had gone to the market to buy vegetables and sweets she had asked for.

“My mother returned home and said that she wants to call the police as Saleem had misbehaved with her at the sweet shop. We told her to tell us what happened,” she said.

Narrating the incident, Priya said that Saleem was coming from work when he spotted Anita at the sweet shop and made an “offensive” gesture.

“My mother then said ‘ tu marega kisi din ’ [you will die someday]. At this, he abused her and then gestured as if he would hit her. She came back home and told us all about the incident,” she said.

Priya’s elder brother then went to Saleem’s house, located right opposite theirs, and criticised him for misbehaving with his mother. At this, Saleem brought a chopper from inside and stabbed him in the stomach. Hearing the commotion, Ram Pal and Anita intervened. Saleem stabbed them too.

Screamed for help

“He first stabbed my father in the stomach and then slashed my mother’s throat. She died on the spot. He then went back to my father and did not let go of him. All this happened within a few minutes,” Priya said.

Meanwhile, the woman claimed that she took her younger sister a few metres outside the street to save her and also screamed for help. “After the attack, my parents asked my younger brother to run away from the place. He was taken to the hospital by locals in a rickshaw,” she said.

The 18-year-old also said that a lot of people stood watching the incident and captured it in their phones, but none came to the family’s rescue. She also alleged that her parents were left to bleed on the street for over an hour and a half, but no one took them to the hospital. “The police also reached after an hour and a half. Meanwhile, I ran to my uncle’s house a few kilometres away to ask for help. By the time, I returned police had taken my parents to hospital,” she said.

The neighbours said that they got really scared because the accused was trying to attack everyone who tried to intervene. “I tried to intervene but he started waving the knife at me. He did the same with two others too. I took my daughter and went inside. I also fainted ,” said Sonia, a neighbour.

Another neighbour Manpreet said that her husband threw a few stones at the accused and that is when he fled the spot in fear of getting caught.

The daughter said that she had come home from her in-laws’ house in Agra only two days ago.

Ram Pal used to work in a dye manufacturing company. Priya’s younger sister is in Class II and younger brother in Class V. The elder brother used to work in a factory manufacturing bulb holders.

(*Names changed)