Trespassing boy shot dead near Chennai army area

An Army jawan allegedly opened fire at a slum boy who had scaled a wall to pluck fruit inside the Army residential quarters behind Fort St. George here on Sunday.

The boy took the bullet in his head and died soon after admission in government general hospital, according to police.

The boy, K. Dilshan, 13, was the son of a carpenter living in nearby Indira Nag-ar slum and was employed in a plastic cover making company. Along with a couple of friends, he had scaled the Army compound wall to pluck some almond fruit when a jawan allegedly shot him.

The bullet went through his head and the boy collapsed in a pool of blood. The other boys ran to inform Dilshan’s parents, who rushed to the place and removed the unconscious boy to the GH, where he died soon afterwards.

“The boy died due to a penetrating injury to the skull, suspected to have been caused by a bullet,” said Dr V. Sunder, neuro head at the GH.

But a senior Army officer in charge of administration, Brig Sashi Nair, insisted that the guards in the quarters carried no guns.

“In this colony, there are no armed guards. Whether a civilian has shot, whether an Army man has shot or whether a policeman has shot, I cannot comment at this stage. That (probe) has to be done by the police,” he said.

Irate residents of Indira Nagar blocked roads at Island Grounds, the War Memorial and the GH, demonstrating against the senseless killing. Police resorted to lathi-charge to disperse the protestors at War Memorial when they stoned a passing Army truck and a police vehicle.