A man lay on the ground as his friend fired three bullets at him within 11 seconds in Uttar Pradesh’s Meerut, only to stop when an accomplice recording the incident asked him to “drop it”.
A chilling video of the shooting was then uploaded online, raising serious questions about law and order in the city where months ago, Muskaan Rastogi and her lover had murdered her husband and sealed his chopped body with cement in a drum.
The 11-second clip of the act went viral, showing Adil being shot three times in succession in the chest by his own friend on Wednesday. A voice in the background can be heard saying, “Drop it”. And then, the accused leave the spot on a motorcycle.
Adil’s body was later found near a tubewell and it was verified by the police that he was the man who was shot in the video. Police are still verifying if Adil was unconscious before being shot or whether the video was recorded after he had already been killed.
Police say this is the first case in Meerut where a murder was filmed and deliberately made viral, in an apparent attempt to create panic. Six accused are named in the case filed by Adil’s family.
Meerut SSP Dr Vipin Tada said, “We are probing the reasons behind the murder and why the accused chose to make the video viral.” The SSP also noted that the deliberate filming and circulation of the act raise concerns that organised gangs may be behind such attempts to openly challenge the police.
On the same day, two more murders were reported in different parts of Meerut.
With inputs from Sanuj Sharma