Bengaluru: A food truck owner was assaulted by a corporator and his goons in HSR Layout on Thursday night. Shakthi Subbarao, the victim and owner of a food truck “Gipsy Kitchen” was assaulted by Gurumurthy Reddy, corporator of ward no. 174, after the former refused to move the truck away from 27th main road in HSR Layout, where he has been selling fast-food for the last two years. Shakthi later lodged a complaint against the corporator and his men at the HSR Layout police station.
The incident happened around 10:45 pm, when an inebriated Gurumurthy along with five to six drunken men, came near Shakthi’s food truck and demanded that he move to a different location as it was causing nuisance in the area. When Shakthi reasoned with the corporator why he was being targeted, when several other push-cart vendors were doing their business by encroaching footpaths, the corporator got angry and started verbally abusing him. Later his men assaulted Shakthi by hitting with a stool on his head and vandalizing his food truck.
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“The corporator was so drunk that he could barely stand. He started roughing up Shakthi and poured hot oil from the van’s kitchen all over the vehicle and threw around the vessels and food that was prepared. Then Reddy’s henchmen surrounded Shakthi and assaulted him,” said Varun, Shakthi’s friend.
On Thursday Shakthi was working along with two of his workers in the mobile eatery’s kitchen, which they normally operate from 7 pm to 11 pm. “The corporator along with his three men had come once at 7 pm and had told me that I should move to another area. I only asked what needs to be done legally so that I can have my business running and pointed to other pushcart eateries that were also encroaching footpaths and why is he (corporator) having problem only with me. Following which I opened my food truck only at 8:30 pm,” Shakthi told Deccan Chronicle. My food truck is only parked at a designated public parking space with no inconvenience to anyone for that matter, he added.
“Around 10:45 pm, the corporator along with six others, who claimed to be his supporters, all drunk, came back to my food truck and assaulted me and vandalised my truck,” said Shakthi. “I had to shut down my truck and later lodge a police complaint,” he added.
However, Corporator Gurumurthy told this newspaper, “I was returning home at night when I saw people quarrelling near the food truck causing nuisance. I only intervened and chided both the parties for quarrelling and for that the owner of food truck has lodged a police complaint against me. We have instructed all the road-side vendors to move from 27th Main to Subramanya temple road, but some vendors, including Shakthi, are adamantly running their businesses on the busy main road.”
