New Delhi, Sept. 24: Delhi’s lawless roads proved more treacherous than the slippery heights of war-torn Kargil for Kantilal Guliani.

The Kargil veteran, who had survived the enemy’s bullets in the icy Dras sector six years ago, fell to the knife of an unknown assailant a few yards from his home in west Delhi last night.

The former naik subedar, a winner of two bravery medals, had been working as a security guard with the M5 private security agency in Hauz Khas after retiring from the army three years ago.

Yesterday, minutes after he had left home to go to work around 8.30 pm, he was found lying on the road with deep stab wounds in his right leg.

Guliani’s family alleged he was left unattended for 45 minutes in hospital and slowly bled to death before their eyes.

The smashed windowpanes and broken furniture at Orchid Nursing Home, Janakpuri, bore witness to the relatives’ anger.

The family believes Guliani may have been attacked while getting into a bus and fallen on the road. They suggested the assailant probably thought his bag, in which he carried his dinner, contained cash.

Although police are not sure whether Guliani was stabbed inside a bus or on the road, they have detained several bus drivers and conductors in an effort to find the killer.

Guliani’s wife Savita and other relatives had reached the hospital soon after the stabbing after being informed by those who had found him bleeding.

Orchid Nursing Home owner Krishna Ganguly denied the allegation of negligence and told the police that Guliani was already dead when he was carried in.

A three-member medical board is probing the charge against the hospital. The police have registered a murder case against the unknown assailant and are investigating the violence at the hospital.