Ratan Modi was on this wheelchair when local youths burst a cracker under it. Picture by Bishwarup Dutta

Rowdies allegedly assaulted a physically impaired man and three members of a family in south Calcutta on Saturday night for protesting against bursting firecrackers.

Ratan Modi, a 30-year-old stationery shop owner on Sultan Alam Road near Charu Market, was allegedly kicked and punched by a group of four youths when he tried to stop them from bursting crackers under his wheelchair.

He was admitted to MR Bangur Hospital in Tollygunge on Sunday morning after he suffered a bout of vomiting, complained of severe pain in the lower abdomen and fell unconscious, his family said.

“The youths used to harass him every now and then. They had earlier assaulted him for no reason. We had lodged police complaints but no action was taken,” alleged nephew Manoj Kumar Modi.

They accosted him on Saturday after he closed his shop around 11pm, bought his dinner from a nearby eatery and was returning home on his wheelchair, Manoj alleged.

“The youths were bursting crackers on the middle of street. They rolled one under my uncle’s wheelchair and it burst,” he said.

Ratan protested but the youths apparently told him to go ahead and lodge a police complaint. He didn’t reply and started towards home when his phone rang. The youths allegedly overheard the conversation when he was narrating his plight to the caller, a relative in Jharkhand.

“They pulled him out of the wheelchair and started kicking and punching him on his abdomen,” Manoj alleged.

They left Ratan in a semiconscious state but he managed to call his nephew, who took him to MR Bangur Hospital. Doctors sent him home after giving him painkillers.

In the morning, he lodged a complaint with Charu Market police station against the assailants. Later he fell ill and was admitted to the hospital.

Residents of an apartment building on Raja Basanta Roy Road near Lake Market allegedly beat up a couple and their four-year-old son following a tiff over crackers.

The incident occurred when private firm employee Prasanta Sarkhel was returning home with his wife Rani and son Joy from a Kali Puja pandal. His brothers Shankar and Kartik were with him.

“When we were crossing a six-storey building, a resident threw a cracker in front of my son and it burst,” alleged Sarkhel, who stays two houses away. “When I protested, they threw another cracker and we went in to confront them.”

The residents of the building allegedly assaulted them on the stairway. “They kicked my wife so hard that she rolled down the stairs,” he alleged.

Rani and Sarkhel’s brothers were admitted at MR Bangur Hospital. A complaint has been lodged at Tollygunge police station.