The IISER or Indian Institutes of Science Education and Research on Thursday expressed sorrow over the death of its scientist, Dr Abhishek Swarnkar, during a parking dispute in Punjab’s Mohali. In a statement, the IISER said they have “lost a brilliant mind” and demanded strict action against the accused.

“We have lost a brilliant mind. Such an act of violence is unacceptable, and strict action should be taken against the accused,” it said, as quoted by news agency IANS.

The statement also mentioned that Dr Swarnkar was selected by the Department of Science and Technology to meet Nobel Laureates in 2017. It added that his research paper was recently published in the prestigious Journal of Science.

Originally from Jharkhand’s Dhanbad, Dr Swarnkar had recently returned to India from Switzerland and joined IISER as a project scientist.

The 39-year-old scientist died on Tuesday night after his neighbour, Monty, pushed him to the ground and punched him during an altercation over a parking issue near his rented home in Mohali’s Sector 67.

A CCTV footage of the incident shows some residents, including the accused, standing near the scientist’s bike. Dr Swarnkar can be then seen walking towards his bike and starting to remove it when an argument followed between him and the residents. A few seconds later, Monty can be seen pushing Dr Swarnkar to the ground and hitting him. The scientist’s family then intervened and pulled Monty away.

The scientist, who had recently undergone a kidney transplant and was on dialysis, was rushed to a nearby hospital, where he died.

Dr Swarnkar’s mother, Malti Devi, narrating the harrowing incident to NDTV, said, “They regularly bothered us, don’t park here, don’t park there. He (Abhishek) returned from IISER (that night) and parked his bike. They asked him to remove it and there was an argument. They shouted, ‘We will blow up the bike’. I told them, ‘It is in front of you, blow it up’. My son got agitated. My husband was downstairs and was talking to them. My son went downstairs. He moved his bike to show them how difficult it would be to take it out if he parked where they wanted him to.”

According to the elderly woman, they had been staying in the rented house since December 2023.

“We did not know the system then, that people park right outside their homes. My son kept moving his bike from one spot to another as some or the other person asked him to. We felt harassed that no matter where the bike was parked, someone had a problem,” she said.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Thursday condemned Russian President Vladimir Putin’s ambivalent response to a proposed ceasefire as “very manipulative”.

“We now have all heard from Russia Putin’s very predictable, very manipulative words in response to the idea of a ceasefire,” Zelensky said in his nightly address.

Putin said Thursday in his first public comments on a 30-day ceasefire proposed by the United States and backed by Ukraine that he was in favour but had “serious questions” about how it would work.

Washington has called for Russia to accept a ceasefire without preconditions but Putin listed a number of obstacles in the way.

“We do not set conditions that complicate anything. Russia does that,” Zelensky said.

“As we have always said, the only one who will drag things out, the only one who will be unconstructive, is Russia.”

Zelensky accused Putin of “actually preparing a refusal” but claimed he was “afraid to say directly to President Trump that he wants to continue this war”. He also said Putin was “framing the idea of a ceasefire with such preconditions that nothing will work out at all, or for as long as possible”.

In his comments Thursday, Putin raised concerns that Ukraine would use a ceasefire to its military benefit, and said Russia wanted to press ahead as its forces made advances.

He also questioned how the ceasefire would be monitored across a front line thousands of kilometres long.

“Putin often does this — he doesn’t say ‘no’ directly, but he does it in such a way that he practically only delays everything and makes normal solutions impossible. We think that this is all just another Russian manipulation,” Zelensky said.

He added that the American side said they were “ready to organise control and verification” of the ceasefire.

“It is feasible to ensure this with American capabilities, European capabilities. And to prepare answers to all the questions about long-term security and real, reliable peace during the ceasefire and put a plan to end the war on the table,” Zelensky said.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

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