KOZHIKODE: Friends of Muhammad Shahabaz, the Class 10 student who died following a clash between students in Thamarassery, are yet to come out of the trauma. A week ago, on Thursday evening, Shahabaz went out with his friends and suffered severe head injury in a clash with students of GVHSS Thamarassery School.
“I regret that we went there and lost our friend in the clash,” said one of the friends from MJ Higher Secondary School who accomapnied Shahabaz. “Clashes occur between students at the school often. But we used to talk it out. What did he (Shahabaz) do to deserve this much torture and death?” asked one of his friends.
After the minor clash between students of MJ Higher Secondary School and GVHSS Thamarassery at the Triz Tuition Centre in Thamarassery during the farewell programme of Class 10 students on Sunday, students of both schools created WhatsApp and Instagram group chats and gathered other students to take revenge.
Following a major clash at the heart of the Thamarassery town near the old bus stand on February 27, Shahabaz suffered severe brain and skull injury and he succumbed on March 1 while under treatment at Kozhikode MCH. The police arrested six students of GVHSS Thamarassery, who are accused in the attack.
Police suspect that the attack on Shahabaz was premeditated. The police have found several group chats such as ‘Team Hermalins’ and ‘Team Halal’ belonging to GVHSS Thamarassery students and ‘Angamaly’ of MJ Higher Secondary School discussing the fights. However, the Instagram chats of the accused students revealed that they were planning to attack Shahabaz.
Probe team collects evidence
The investigation team on Wednesday visited Shahabaz’s house to check his mobile phone. Cyber cell experts have asked ‘Meta’ for information about the Instagram accounts through which the miscreants planned the attack on Shahabaz.
The probe team has sent an email to Meta, asking it to clarify the source of the audio messages and whether the accounts were fake. The police are also seeking information about the devices used for operating the Instagram accounts, including mobile phones.
“We have found that many of the messages sent to Shahbaz by the accused students were deleted. We have started efforts to recover these messages,” said Sayooj Kumar, SHO, Thamarassery police station.
There were 63 students in the social media group formed to discuss about the attack. The student who directly attacked Shahabaz with a ‘nunchaku’ caused serious head injuries.
The search history of this boy’s mobile phone contains videos showing the use of ‘nunchaku.’ Shahabaz’s farther Muhammad Iqbal said that, in addition to the arrested six students, many more were involved in the gruesome attack.
