The investigation into the murder of Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) leader Baba Siddique has revealed that the accused conducted reconnaissance of his son and MLA Zeeshan’s Bandra office at least 10 times with weapons on them, according to the Mumbai Police sources.
Siddique, 66, a former Congress leader who had joined the NCP earlier this year, was waylaid by three persons in Mumbai’s Nirmal Nagar area, just outside his MLA son Zeeshan’s office, and shot on Saturday night.
The Mumbai Police’s crime branch has so far arrested shooters Gurmail Singh and Dharmaraj Kashyap; Shubham Lonkar, whose post linked the shooting to the Lawrence Bishnoi gang, and his brother and dairy owner, Pravin Lonkar; and Harish Kumar Nishad, 24. Harish is Kashyap’s cousin. Mastermind Mohammed Zeeshan Akhtar and another accused and main shooter Shiv Kumar Gautam are still absconding.
The details of the investigation from Mumbai Police sources:
- The accused used to wait for hours outside Siddique’s office and track his movement. They used to recce the place in an autorickshaw or on bike.
- Harish purchased mobile phones for Dharmraj and Shiv Kumar. Aware of the plan, he also bought a bike for them for Rs 60,000 from Pune and arranged for a rented accommodation at Patel chawl in Kurla. Harish rode the bike from Pune to Mumbai, which was then used by Shiv.
- On Saturday, Akhtar was not in Mumbai. He was co-ordinating the operation from outside the city.
- The shooters were brought to Mumbai by Pravin. He gave them some money as well.
- The crime weapon came from Punjab. A 9-mm foreign made pistol has been recovered, which the police suspect Akhtar got from Pakistan or Nepal.
- Three mobile phones recovered from two of the accused have several numbers that are not saved.
- Cops suspect that the attackers were under the influence of marijuana. Small traces of ganja powder were found in the hideout at Kurla, where they were staying. Police are now trying to find their supplier.
- The Kurla house was obtained on rent 20 days before the shooting. The accused told their neighbours they worked at a call centre.
- They used to visit Bandra every night on their bike.
- The accused ate anda pav at a place outside their residence before they left for Siddique’s office on Saturday night. They took an autorickshaw ride to the spot where Siddique was shot dead.
CELEBRATORY WEDDING FIRINGS, YOUTUBE VIDEOS FOR GUN TRAINING, SNAPCHAT, INSTAGRAM TO TALK
The Mumbai police’s crime branch found that Shiv had learnt to handle guns during the celebratory firings at weddings in Uttar Pradesh, an official told PTI. Kashyap and Singh were trained in shooting by Shiv at the rented house, where they did “dry practice" (shooting without bullets), he said. They learnt how to load and unload the weapon by watching YouTube videos for nearly four weeks, as they could not find an open space for practice, the official said.
Shubham Lonkar was on police radar till September 24, after he was questioned in June in connection with an incident of firing outside actor Salman Khan’s residence in April, as the involvement of Bishnoi gang was suspected. Shubham was arrested in January in an Arms Act case registered at Akot police station in Maharashtra’s Akola district, but he later got bail. Police had recovered more than 10 firearms in that case, an official said. Shubham was found to be in communication with Bishnoi’s brother Anmol. He went untraceable on September 24, the official said.
During the investigation, it also came to light that the accused used to communicate with each other using social media apps such as Snapchat and Instagram, he said.
Shubham had asked all members involved in the plan to kill Siddique to speak via Instagram and chat through Snapchat to avoid surveillance, the official said. Snapchat has a feature which automatically deletes most messages after they have been viewed or expired.
With PTI Inputs
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