Nayabazar, Jugsalai resident Uttam Verma is determined to vote — because of the tragedy that befell his family two-and-half years ago.

Uttam’s two brothers, their grandmother and a friend of Uttam’s were lynched by a mob at Nagadih in Bagbera, around 9km from the steel city, on the night of May 18, 2017.

Uttam and his younger brothers, Gautam Kumar and Vikas Verma, had gone to to promote their new business of digging pits for toilets. Around the time, messages were doing the rounds on social media about kidnappers of children being on the prowl. A thousand-strong mob caught the brothers, suspecting them to be kidnappers. The mob did not even spare the brothers’ grandmother, Ram Sakhi Devi, 78, or friend Gangesh Gupta, who had rushed to the spot along with the brothers’ Aadhaar cards to prove their identities.

“Nothing is left in our family,” said Uttam, 29, who survived by escaping when the cops arrived.

“Our family has been devastated, business has nose-dived. My father has suddenly developed heart problems and hypertension, grandfather is suffering from urinary tract infections, mother gets terrified whenever I have to go out.My sister had to give up her education to look after our business. Everything has turned upside down since that day,” Uttam said.

However, he is determined to cast his vote. “We had cast our votes in the Lok Sabha polls and would do so on December 7 for the Jugsalai Assembly seat with a hope that someday a good representative would come and not let others face the trauma which we underwent,” said Uttam, eyes glistening.

He wants the death sentence for the perpetrators, and a CBI investigation.

“What hurts us is that nobody has supported our demand for a CBI probe into the case. We had met our MP, chief minister, MLAs and written several times to our PM. But to no avail. We only got Rs 2 lakh as compensation. Most of the perpetrators are out on bail,” Uttam said.

“We want a CBI probe into the case as we feel that it was the police failure which led to my brothers killed as the lynching took place in the presence of the Bagbera police including the then OC (officer in-charge). We also want death sentence for all those involved in the lynching,” said Uttam.

According to Bagbera police sources, cases have been lodged under sections 147 (rioting), 148 (rioting armed with deadly weapons), 324 (voluntarily causing hurt with dangerous weapons), 307 (attempt to murder), 337 (causing hurt endangering life), 302 (murder), 114 (abettor present when offence is committed), 120B (criminal conspiracy), 341 (wrongful restraint) and 342 (wrongful confinement) of the IPC in the case.