PATNA: Even after advisory from MHA followed by a stern home department directive to all districts for crackdown on celebratory firing, precious lives continued to be lost in Bihar with death of an 18-year-old female dancer in Saharsa district on wee hours of Thursday due to indiscriminately celebratory firing in a marriage ceremony.On Tuesday night only, a youth was shot at during celebratory firing at a marriage function near Sadakat Ashram under Patliputra police station area in state capital.The Saharsa incident took place at Viratpur village under Sonbarsa Raj police station area where the dancer, identified as Akriti Singh along with at least four other companions, were hired along with an orchestra by the family of the bride for entertaining the guest who were relatives of the bridegroom and had reached Viratnagar for attending the marriage.Saharsa SP Rakesh Kumar said that the deceased was dancing on stage when suddenly she was shot in head due to the celebratory firing by audiences who were guests at the marriage.“All the guests later fled from spot. An FIR was lodged with Sonbarsa Raj police station by deceased’s maternal uncle against one Ashish Singh and other unknown persons,” he said.Kumar said it was marriage of Singh’s younger sister in which they had hired orchestra of one Dilip Yadav along with some dancers.“The bridegroom is a chartered accountant based in Bangalore,” he said adding raids were on to nab all accused persons involved in celebratory including the one who killed the dancer. Kumar said all suspects had fled from village.The SP said that no empty cartridges were recovered from spot.Meanwhile, a villager, who claimed to have attended the marriage, told TOI over phone that the incident took place at around 3am.“I was at the marriage function till 11pm. That time, around three persons who were from bridegroom’s side, had opened fire in air at least 20 rounds in air using pistols,” he said adding all of them were in inebriated state that time. He said there were at least four dancers in the orchestra.“We came to know that one of the guests in inebriated state was hurling currencies of Rs 100 on the dancer with one hand while from another hand, he was indulged in celebratory firing from a pistol when the dancer was shot dead,” he said.He said bridegroom’s father is a lawyer in Saharsa town while groom’s father Chawal Singh is a farmer in village.

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