New Delhi: A 36-year-old Kanpur man died on Tuesday, September 28, following a police “verification drive” in a Gorakhpur hotel, NDTV reported. The police allege that the man died in an “accident” in which he fell over; however, the six police officers involved in the raid have been suspended pending an enquiry into the incident.The victim, Manish Kumar Gupta, was a real estate businessman and had been sharing the hotel room with two of his friends, Pradeep Chauhan and Hardeep Singh Chauhan, both of whom are from Gurgaon. These two men told the media that they were “business associates” in town to visit a mutual friend.According to the police, the officers were on a routine verification drive and became suspicious when they found that the three men, who were from different cities, were staying in the hotel under one ID card, the Times of India reported.Also read: Watch | ‘Why Were UP Police in Such a Hurry to Declare Mahant Narendra Giri’s Death a Suicide?’The men had apparently come to Gorakhpur on an invitation from a mutual friend, Chandan Saini. The four men had spent the evening in the hotel room after which Saini left, speaking about plans of sightseeing the next day.According to Hardeep Singh, the police arrived at their room around midnight and asked for identity proof. When he asked them why they had barged into the room at such a late hour, they allegedly slapped him. Singh showed them his Aadhaar card and gave them Saini’s number, after which they woke Gupta to ask him questions.Singh went on to claim that, when Gupta asked the police why they were disturbing him in the middle of the night, they started beating him, at which point Singh was taken out of the room. He said that Gupta was dragged out of the room a few minutes later, his face bloodied. Singh went on to note that some of the policemen appeared drunk. The police then took Gupta to the hospital where he died.The police, however, claim that Gupta had been visibly drunk when they arrived at the scene and had thus slipped and sustained fatal injuries to his face. The police also claimed that they had been provided information on “suspicious” men staying at the hotel.Also read: The Police Did Not Bungle in Assam, They Committed a Horrific CrimeRavinder Gaud, deputy inspector general (DIG) Gorakhpur, is personally monitoring a probe into the incident on the basis of the witnesses’ statements and a post-mortem report to ascertain the cause of death. “We have not ruled anything out till now,” Gaud told the Times of India.Vipid Tada, senior superintendent of police Gorakhpur, maintained the police’s account that Gupta had been drunk and sustained his injuries from an accidental slip, yet he suspended the six officers who had been present at the scene. These included J.N. Singh, station house officer of Ramgarhtal station, Akshay Mishra, Phalmandi police post in-charge and four constables.
