Nagpur: A week after a video showing a man transporting his wife’s body on a motorcycle went viral and sparked widespread outrage, Nagpur Police have arrested the lorry driver involved, after tracing him with the aid of artificial intelligence (AI), an official said on Sunday.

The motorcyclist, Amit Yadav, claimed he had no option but to tie his wife’s body to the vehicle, as no one came forward to help following the tragic accident on the Nagpur-Jabalpur national highway on August 9.

Initially, Deolapar Police had no leads regarding the identity of the lorry driver. Officers reviewed footage from multiple CCTV cameras using AI-MARVEL (Maharashtra Advanced Research and Vigilance for Enhanced Law Enforcement), a system developed to support the police in preventing and investigating crime, the official stated.

"Subsequently, the driver was identified as Satyapal Rajendra (28), a resident of Farrukhabad in Uttar Pradesh. The truck was impounded on August 16, and the accused was arrested," he said.

According to police, Yadav, a native of Seoni district in Madhya Pradesh, had been travelling with his wife, Gyarsi, from Lonara in Nagpur to their village, Karanpur, in the neighbouring state, when a speeding lorry struck their motorcycle.

Gyarsi fell onto the road and was run over by the lorry, which then fled the scene, they said.

Despite Yadav's desperate attempts to get help from passing motorists, no one stopped. Left with no alternative, he secured his wife’s body to the pillion seat of the motorbike and attempted to take her home, police said.

A police van later intercepted the motorcycle and transported the body to the Indira Gandhi Medical College in Nagpur for a post-mortem examination.

The widely circulated video shows Yadav riding the motorcycle with his wife’s body tied behind him.

PTI