2 arrested from Punjab in Bengal BJP leader’s murder

The Criminal Investigation Department (CID) of the West Bengal police on Thursday arrested two alleged contract killers, Sujit Kumar Rai and Roshan Yadav, throughout a raid at Ludhiana in Punjab in reference to the homicide of Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) chief Manish Shukla on October 4.

Rai and Yadav hail from Bihar, CID officers stated. They have been delivered to Bengal’s North 24 Parganas district, the place Shukla was gunned down, and produced earlier than Barrackpore court docket on Friday afternoon.

CID officers stated on situation of anonymity that Rai and Yadav have been deployed by Bihar-based gangster Subodh Singh. Singh was lodged at Beur jail in Bihar throughout the homicide. The alleged hitmen returned to Bihar after the homicide and later went to Punjab to evade arrest.

CID officers claimed to have discovered throughout investigation that Singh contacted Rai and Yadav and even equipped the firearms. The info was given to the probe staff by one other accused Muhammad Nasir Khan, a resident of North 24 Parganas district, who allegedly approached Singh.

Manish Shukla, 39, an outgoing councillor of the Titagarh municipality in North 24 Parganas district was gunned down by motorcycle-borne hitmen on the evening of October 4. Five folks have been arrested earlier however the CID and state authorities have thus far made no official assertion on the investigation. Police have seized some firearms and three bikes allegedly used within the crime which passed off inside 100 metres of Titagarh police station.

Shukla, a former Trinamool Congress (TMC) chief, joined the BJP after the opposition occasion gained 18 of the state’s 42 Lok Sabha seats in 2019. One of those seats is Barrackpore, of which Titagarh is a component.

In Shukla’s homicide, 9 folks have been named within the First Information Report (FIR) on the idea of the grievance lodged by his father Chandra Mani Shukla. The outgoing chairman of Barrackpore municipality, Uttam Das and his counterpart in Titagarh municipality, Prashanta Choudhury, have been named within the FIR.

Barrackpore’s BJP MP Arjun Singh, who additionally switched camp in 2018, has accused the chairpersons of two civic our bodies and TMC lawmaker from Panihati, Nirmal Das, of masterminding the homicide with the assistance of some cops.

On October 11, Bengal BJP leaders alleged earlier than governor Jagdeep Dhankhar that the state CID is attempting to implicate leaders from the occasion within the homicide case. A BJP staff, led by nationwide vice-president Mukul Roy, met Dhankhar on the Raj Bhawan and stated the CID probe was not shifting in the correct course.

Dhankhar raised the difficulty earlier than the media in Delhi on Thursday after assembly Union house minister Amit Shah.