Thirty Rupies worth of bananas have led to the death of two young men from Kot Radha Kishan, where their funerals were flooded by shocked villagers over the weekend.
Wajid and his brother Rashid, both in their twenties, had traveled to Raiwind, Lahore by bus, before planning to go home to their village. They went against a cluster of fruit sellers to buy bananas near Rohi Nala.
Bananas are RS130 a dozen, but the brothers had only one hundred rupee note and a five thousand-peppe note. They asked the fruit seller to give them a change for the bigger note. But when he said he did not have it, the brothers asked him to reduce their number of bananas. A fight broke out.
Wajid and Rashid were poorly beaten, and the fruit salesman called for back-up from some friends who played cricket nearby.
A video of the match shows Rashid, who cradles his brother in his lap on the ground where blood flows down his head as a young man accuses against him and hits him over his head with a cricket bat.
Wajid died at the scene and Rashid was taken to the hospital. But he did not survive the head injury and died on Monday. His funeral was held the same day.
Police arrested a man identified as Taimur as the cricket-bat-performing striker and a four has been registered for willful murder of the city’s police station Raiwind in accordance with section 302 of the Pakistan Penal Code.
Thousands of citizens participated in the funeral prayer. Wajid, 22, was unmarried, but Rashid leaves five children. Police are in search of the other fruit sellers who participated in the fight.
The victims’ families said spectators filmed the assault instead of helping and appealing to justice.
The locals called for the case to be handed over to Punjab’s newly created Counter Crime Department (CCD) and suggested fours against those filming the attack instead of helping.
