India, Oct. 26 -- Eight men were arrested, and a juvenile was apprehended on Saturday for allegedly assaulting a 20-year-old Dalit man in Jatola village, Farrukhnagar, after a dispute over bursting firecrackers on Diwali night, police said.

According to investigators, the victim, an ITI diploma student, alleged that the assailants attacked him with sticks and iron rods and hurled caste-based slurs.

Police said the dispute began when the victim and his five friends had asked two men not to burst crackers near them on Diwali night. The two groups allegedly clashed that evening, but the matter was settled then, officers said.

However, around 7.30pm on Thursday, an argument broke out again when the victim was seated on an empty plot outsid...