A splash of water from a bike (not the one in the picture) led to the fatal assault on the pedestrian

A youth who bled to death on a Calcutta road a fortnight ago and was passed off as an accident victim had actually been fatally assaulted for protesting when a motorbike splashed muddy water on him.

The detective department has yet to identify the 35-year-old victim, but the three alleged assailants — Raju Jaiswal, Ricky Shaw and Amandip Shaw, all in their early 20s — were arrested on Wednesday. The investigation had begun only after the post-mortem report mentioned that the injuries on the youth’s body were “homicidal in nature”.

Based on the accounts of witnesses who had kept quiet till the probe began, investigators have since confirmed that the victim was walking down Jatindra Mohan Avenue on the night of August 21 when the incident occurred.

“He protested when the wheels of the motorbike hit a pothole on Jatindra Mohan Avenue and dirtied his clothes. That provoked the three riders into attacking him. The post-mortem report even mentions a strangulation mark on his throat,” said Jawed Shamim, the deputy commissioner of the detective department.

Witnesses told the investigators that they saw the victim collapsing and his head hitting the pavement. He lay there bleeding until the next morning, when a team from Burtolla police station took him to RG Kar Medical College and Hospital. He was dead by then.

Burtolla police station mentioned in its records that the youth was fatally injured when he stumbled and fell on the pavement under the influence of alcohol. But the post-mortem report that came four days later almost ruled out a mishap.

“Our team immediately started interrogating all likely witnesses, mostly owners of shops along the entire stretch of Jatindra Mohan Avenue. We first came to know that the attack occurred 100 metres from the spot where the body was found,” Shamim said.

The owner of a sweet shop told the police that he saw the youth, in grey jeans and a white shirt with yellow stripes, wobbling on the pavement with blood oozing out of his head. “He and some others did not try to help the victim because they presumed he was drunk and had been involved in a brawl. None of them even bothered to inform the police,” one of the investigators said.

The police learnt later that the three men involved in the assault were from the neighbourhood. “They are from nearby Grey Street. They have confessed to committing the crime,” the officer said.