Bengaluru: 5 arrested for assaulting Tanzanian woman, 'racism' angle tops global headlines

Five people suspected of assaulting a Tanzanian woman were arrested early on Thursday, Police Commissioner NS Megharik said, as the ‘racism’ blot refuses to wash away from the headlines both local and global. Tanzania’s High Commissioner to India John Kijazi on Thursday told The Indian Express that the girl was attacked because “she was black”, and that the incident had “an element of racism” mixed with mob justice. “We have arrested the five accused after interrogating them on Wednesday night under detention in the case registered on the victim’s statement in a road rage incident,” Megharik told IANS here. [caption id=“attachment_2611930” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  Racist? Who me? Couldn’t be! A screen grab from CNN-IBN[/caption] The commissioner, however, did not disclose names and age of the five accused. The Hindu reports on one of the witnesses saying two policemen at the scene did not help the victim and instead pushed her again towards the angry mob. Media in the US picking up the story is headlining ‘racism’ and questioning Bengaluru’s credentials as India’s Silicon Valley. In a case of mistaken identity, a mob assaulted the victim, Lina Martin, 21, suspecting her to be a friend of a Sudanese student, Mohammad Ahad, whose car ran over a woman pedestrian (Shabana Taz) fatally while driving drunk on the same (Sunday) night. “Arrest of the accused has been made on the basis of eye witnesses’ account and from the video footage from closed circuit television cameras (CCTV) in the area. We will produce them in a local court for custody and further interrogation,” Megharik said. Denying reports in a section of media that the victim was stripped and paraded, Megharik said in her statement that she was only assaulted and molested in which her T-shirt was torn off. “Though the car mishap was 30 minutes before the victim reached the spot in the other car, the mob thought she was Ahad’s friend and assaulted her,” deputy police commissioner T.R. Suresh told reporters on Wednesday night. Ahad was also arrested on Sunday night for the fatal mishap involving his car and drunken driving. Police did not register the case soon after the road mishap and the mob attack, as the victim was not in city for two days since Sunday to record her statement. With IANS inputs