BANGALORE: It was a deadly cocktail of chicken kebab, alcohol and guns. The chicken, bland and not done too well, sparked off a brawl in a dim-lit bar and culminated in a shootout, in which three persons were injured.

From Neelaiah Padamashali's seat at the cash counter of Dhanalakshmi Bar and Restaurant, Saraswathipuram, off West of Chord Road, it appeared to be a routine scrap between men who had had a few pegs. It was 10.45pm Tuesday, almost time to close. Three customers were arguing with a bartender over the sprinkling of spice in the chicken kebab, and demanded that chilli chicken also be served. But they wanted to be billed for only one dish.

Neelaiah, 61, ignored it, assuming the men would pipe down when they'd had kebabs with an extra topping of chilli. He didn't intervene. But things were getting messy with the three men raising their voices. They were later identified as realtor Anjan Kumar Lakshmipathi, 33, Ravi Nagendra Rao, 34, owner of Maruthi Bar, Laggere, while the third customer was unidentified.

And then, an assistant bartender came running up, yelling, "Saar, pistoolu, pistoolu!" A flummoxed Neelaiah ran to the corner to find Ravi brandishing a revolver and shouting, "We aren't paying, the chicken kebab was not roasted properly. And it was bland…"

Neelaiah warned he would call police. "Hearing this, the three charged at me and the man with the revolver took aim. I started running towards the door when I heard a loud noise. Something hit my left ankle and I fell," Neelaiah told reporters from his bed in Sanjeevini Hospital, Mahalakshmi Layout.

Once Neelaiah was down, the three customers sped away in a car. In the ensuing chaos, customers ran away from the bar, many of them without paying bills, said Rajendra, a bartender. The bar staffers said Ravi was highly inebriated and could have killed Neelaiah. Police confirmed that Ravi was carrying a licensed .32 revolver.

Police take over

Mahalakshmi Layout police arrived and launched a hunt for the runaway trio. They traced the three men in their car near Laggere bridge around 11.30pm, and a shootout ensued at JC Nagar, near Kanteerava Studios. A bullet pierced Anjan's knee, while Ravi got two bullets in his leg. The third person who was with them in Dhanalakshmi Bar is yet to be identified, and is absconding.

DCP (North) SN Sidramappa told TOI, "A team led by two inspectors reached the spot and saw Ravi and Anjan fleeing. They were asked to surrender. Instead, Ravi opened fire at us and police retaliated in self-defence."

Police, however, were unable to say how many rounds of fire the three men opened. They couldn't identify the car the trio had used, and it isn't clear if the car is in their custody. Police, though, claimed they opened fire in the air and shot at the trio only after repeated warnings failed, and didn't confirm if their personnel were injured in the exchange of fire.

Ravi and Anjan were arrested and admitted to KC General Hospital , where they are said to be out of danger. Neelaiah is recovering too, police quoted doctors as saying.

Family members of Anjan Kumar Chalapathi, a Nandini Layout resident, and Ravi Nagendra Rao, from Basaveshwara Nagar, are not ready to buy the police theory on the shootout. Ravi's father told reporters at KC General Hospital, "Police should have arrested them instead of shooting. We have medical reports to say Ravi was not inebriated."

Ravi told a cousin that the bar employees beat him up and he had to open fire in self-defence, they added. They also alleged that Ravi and Anjan were picked up by police at the bar and the 'shootout' at Laggere was staged.

Ravi's advocate Girish Kumar termed the shootout a 'fake encounter'. "Ravi is a nice gentleman and he wouldn't ever fire at police. His father was a central intelligence official. Doctors have certified he wasn't drunk at the time," he said.

"We'll look into the allegations and if required, take suitable steps," Kamal Pant, additional commissioner of police (law and order) said.

