Chased to 3rd floor, Manipuri musician beaten to death at Delhi home

Before he was beaten to death outside his South Delhi home, Manipuri musician Chongtham Vikram Singh, 55, was allegedly chased and assaulted by eight eatery workers in the stair lobby of the building where he lived with his wife and son on the third floor.

Police have registered a case under Section 103(2), which deals with mob lynching by a group of five or more people, at the Sunlight Colony police station. Seven accused have been arrested. The eighth, a juvenile, has also been apprehended.

Four of the accused worked at Saini Dhaba: Bharat Kumar, 19, and Pramod, 26, are food delivery agents; Deepanshu, 21, and Mohan Vishwakarma, 32, work in food packaging. The other three are Ramzan Khan, 22, a food delivery agent at New Choudhary Dhaba; Vijay, 36, a food delivery agent at Annapurna Dhaba; and Mannu, 26, who works at Diamond Pizza kiosk.

Singh, the lead guitarist of Manipur’s legendary rock band Phoenix in the early 1980s, was regarded as a pioneer of the state’s rock music scene. He began his music career as the lead guitarist of a band called Ultra Vires.

After his stint with Phoenix, he joined another well-known local band, Eastern Dark. He later left Manipur and continued his career as a music teacher in New Delhi. Singh came from a family with a strong musical legacy. His mother, Chongtham Kamala, is a renowned classical singer from Manipur who was once regarded as the “Lata Mangeshkar of the Manipuri film industry”.