A Noida truck driver was allegedly beaten to death on Friday, August 9, by seven bouncers, part of the flying squad, at the toll booth at Yamuna bridge in Kalindi Kunj, Delhi. 

The victim identified as Vimal Tiwari, 40, was a resident of Wazidpur area. He was found dead on the Noida-Delhi carriageway, around 500 metres from the toll booth.

Driver Killed For Skipping Toll Tax

Vimal was carrying a consignment of electrical equipment to Delhi. Around 11.45 PM on Friday, Vimal failed to spot the toll booth before the Kalindi Kunj traffic signal on the new Yamuna bridge and crossed into Delhi without paying a tax of Rs 1,400. 

A few metres away, a squad of 7 people, manning the toll plaza stopped him and demanded ten times the tax amount as fine. 

“Vimal had told the bouncers that he would not be able to pay the fine of Rs 14,000, ten times the toll amount and pleaded them to lower the amount,” Noida circle officer Swetabh Pandey told The Times Of India. 

The toll plaza workers insisted on the payment of full fine, and this sparked an argument between them, and soon Vimal was punched and pinned to the ground.

Lal Bahadur, the owner of the truck and Vimal’s employer, said that the driver had called him, but he could not help him as he had no money.

“The truck’s owner has told us that he had only Rs 5000 with him. So, he called up Vimal’s brother and asked him to arrange for the remaining amount. Both of them managed to arrange the money eventually and reached the toll booth around 6 am on Saturday. But Vimal was dead by then,” a senior officer of Sector 39 Police Station, Noida, told The Times Of India. 

The seven bouncers have been booked under Sections 302 (murder), 147 (rioting), 384 (punishment for extortion) and 149 (every member of unlawful assembly guilty of an offence committed in prosecution of common object) of the IPC.

Lawlessness At Toll Plazas

There have been multiple instances of violence and disorder at toll plazas across the country.

This incident comes after a similar one, where a women toll collector was manhandled and punched by a commuter when she refused to let him pass without paying the tax. This incident took place in Kherki Daula plaza, Gurugram in June 2019. 

On May 16,  two men threatened an employee working at a toll booth with a gun. The accused were later arrested and identified as a physics teacher at a private school and an MBA student. The weapon they were brandishing was a toy gun, purchased from a shop in Delhi.

In another incident in April, some people in an Innova had tried to run over a toll collector who wanted to stop them from passing without paying tax. The men had dragged the collector on the bonnet of their car for several metres, after which they abducted him and beat him up in an isolated area.

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