25-year-old reciting prayers at father’s grave stabbed to death in UP’s Moradabad

Lucknow: A 25-year-old property dealer was stabbed to death by four to five men inside a graveyard in Uttar Pradesh’s Moradabad district on Friday afternoon, the police said. While the police have made one arrest in the case, they are on the lookout for five other accused.

The police identified the deceased as Mohammed Yunus alias Bhola, who stayed in the Daulatbagh area, and said he was at the graveyard to recite the Al-Fatiha, the first chapter of the Quran, at his father’s grave when he was attacked. Yunus’s father Rafiq had passed away on October 21.

Yunus’s cousin Shaquib, who was with him at the time, told the police that four men entered the graveyard and attacked Yunus. He ran but the accused allegedly followed and stabbed him repeatedly, Shaquib said. Yunus was rushed to a hospital but was declared dead by the doctors.

Subsequently, Yunus’s brother Mohammed Yaseen lodged a First Information Report (FIR) at Nagphani police station, naming six men – four brothers, their father, and their family friend, a Congress councillor.

“Our primary investigation has revealed that the deceased’s relationship with a woman of the family named in the FIR could be a reason behind the murder. Six people have been named in the complaint and we have arrested one Ikram so far. Three teams have been formed to nab the remaining accused,” said Kunwar Ranvijay Singh, Superintendent of Police (SP), Moradabad city.

Yunus’s uncle Mohammed Imran told the media in Moradabad on Friday evening that Yunus and the accused had a violent clash four months ago and the matter was settled after the police intervened. “Had the police taken tough punitive action against the accused then, Yunus would have been alive today,” he alleged.