Agra, Sept 06: A 12-year-old Dalit boy was allegedly beaten to death by five minor boys of the same village for touching the balloons which were part of Janmashtami decorations at a temple at the village.

The incident occurred near a Chamunda temple in Nadroi village in Aligarh on Monday evening.

The victim’s friend, Suraj, who was present at the spot when the suspects allegedly beat the boy, said that the five accused, who were of the same age as the victim, objected when his friend touched the balloons. “When one of the balloons burst, they began beating him mercilessly. One of them held his arms and two held his legs, and the other two punched him repeatedly in the stomach. I was afraid, so I immediately ran to his house to call his mother,” said Suraj.

The victim’s elder cousin, Chandrapal, told TOI that the deceased’s mother, Savitri Devi immediately ran towards the temple and saw her son lying there. “She took him home and informed the village pradhan, Shyam Sunder Upadhyaya, but he did not take the issue seriously. My cousin complained of severe stomach ache at around 2:30 am on the intervening night of Monday and Tuesday. His mother took him to the local doctor, but he got no relief. At 4am, we took him to another doctor, who referred us to the district hospital.”

At the Aligarh district hospital, the boy was admitted at 11am on Tuesday and passed away at 12:30 pm. “His mother is a labourer and her husband had passed away eight years ago. Since then, she had been taking care of the family. She has a daughter and three sons. The boy was the youngest in the family.”

An FIR was filed on Tuesday evening against the five boys under section 304 A (culpable homicide not amounting to murder) of IPC and sections of the SC/ST Act.

Superintendent of police (SP) crime Ashutosh Dwivedi said that the matter was being investigated. He said though the post mortem had been conducted, the report was yet to come by Wednesday evening.

Courtesy: timesofindia.indiatimes.com

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Batumi (Georgia), Jul 26 (PTI): Young Indian International Master Divya Deshmukh held her nerves to hold stalwart Koneru Humpy to a draw in game 1 of the FIDE Women's World Cup final, with both players having their share of opportunities to take the lead here on Saturday.

The draw with black means Humpy, the two-time World Rapid champion, holds a slight edge going in the second and final game under the classical chess rules in the two-game mini-match, and should the deadlock continue, games of shorter duration will be played to determine the winner.

Humpy employed the Queen's gambit accepted as black and it turned out to be a pretty fascinating game right out of the opening as Divya, 19, came up with a piece sacrifice early to deny the black king the right to castle.

Humpy was the first to err and, according to computers, Divya had things under control on the 14th move. However in her bid to recover the extra material, the Nagpur girl, who has secured a place in the Candidates tournament with her sterling performance here, missed a promising continuation.

What followed the exchange of all minor pieces and the ensuing queen and rook endgame gave enough counter play to both players. The game was eventually drawn after Humpy sacrificed her rook to force perpetual checks.

"The game saw an extremely sharp battle with the game ending in a draw in 41 moves. On move 7, Divya made her aggressive intentions clear by offering another pawn,

which looked like home preparation. Humpy made a practical decision of refraining from taking the pawn and a balanced position was reached by move 10 by white," said Grandmaster Pravin Thipsay, an Arjuna awardee and the first Indian to get a chess Grandmaster norm.

"However, instead of developing the undeveloped Knight, Humpy retreated the centralised Knight on move 10, giving huge positional advantage to Divya. Divya could have gained huge positional advantage on the 12th move by moving a rook. However, she chose to play for King side attack by sacrificing a piece instead.

"Humpy, too, erred at this stage and instead of moving the King to Queen side, moved it to the King side. Divya, on move 14, could have obtained a crushing attack by threatening a mate by developing her Queen. Instead she chose to exchange a pair of Bishops first, which enabled Humpy to defend her King by returning the piece," said Thipsay.

"Players thus reached a balanced Queen and two Rooks ending. Divya continued to play ambitiously and tried to attack Humpy’s King but the latter defended accurately and the game was drawn in 41 moves by perpetual check," he added.

In the play-off for the third place, Chinese players Zhongyi Tan, the former women's world champion and top seed Lei Tingjie also decided to split points out of a Queen’s gambit declined game.

The opening raised visions of a close contest between the two but having been knocked out of title race in the previous round, none of them wanted to take any huge risk. It was still a middle game when the players shook hands.

With the top two positions sealed for the Indians, the berth to the next Candidates is also assigned, while the player finishing third will also get an entry to the premier event scheduled for 2026.

Results: Divya Deshmukh (Ind) drew with Koneru Humpy (Ind); Zhongyi Tan (Chn) drew with Tingjie Lei (Chn).