The Panangad police have launched a probe into a case in which a motorist was allegedly assaulted at the Kumbalam toll plaza on Sunday afternoon.
The police have registered a case against a migrant worker employed at the toll plaza based on a complaint by Vipin Vijayakumar of Kakkanad.
According to the complainant, he was assaulted by the employees at the toll plaza with the card swiping machine. The police said that CCTV footage were being examined. “The accused alleges that the petitioner tried to forcefully wrest the card swiping machine and assaulted him while the petitioner alleges that he was the one who was assaulted. We are still probing the issue,” said a senior police officer. As per the petitioner, he was on his way to Alappuzha side when he was stopped at the plaza. Since he had no FASTag, he had to pay double the amount for which he gave his ATM card though the swiping machine didn’t generate a receipt after swiping the card twice. When he tried to proceed, the beam for stopping vehicles struck against his vehicle, leading to a heated exchange and a scuffle in which, the police said, both parties received blows.
The police have registered a case invoking among other IPC Sections 323 (voluntarily causing hurt) and 324 (voluntarily causes hurt by means of any instrument for shooting, stabbing or cutting, or any instrument which, used as a weapon of offence, is likely to cause death).
