The villagers firmly believe that the three had come to rob a brick-kiln owner. According to the residents, Jawahar Singh was returning to his village, Jaunti Kateshwar, at around 7.30 pm in his car when he was stopped by three car-borne men. Singh became suspicious after seeing different numberplates at the front and the rear of the vehicle. A man stepped out of the car and approached Jawahar, who apparently sped away. The three gave him a chase and intercepted him near the village.

They reportedly dragged him out of the vehicle, asked him to hand over his money and the car keys and allegedly hit him with a revolver butt. One of them also smashed the windscreen of the car with a revolver butt. The commotion attracted a crowd which managed to overpower the three.

According to DCP (northwest) Satyendra Garg, the three made the mistake by not approaching in a direct manner. ``If they would have shown their identity cards before and told the reason for their presence, the incident could have been prevented.'' He added: ``The matter needs to be probed and we need time for that. It would be unjustified to frame them as guilty in the initial stages''.