Cops clueless in murder convict’s killing

Even as the police remain clueless in the incident related to the gunning down of a murder convict, Dharamjit Singh in Hukam Chand Colony in Chheharta on Thursday night, eight police teams are scanning CCTV camera footage to find clues about the perpetrators of the crime.

The police teams have reportedly scanned around 300 CCTV cameras in areas around the crime scene so far, albeit with little success.

Panic had gripped Hukam Chand Colony late on Thursday night when three youths on a motorcycle shot dead Dharamjit alias Dharma, who was out on parole. After executing the crime, the assailants fled from the scene.

Preliminary investigations suggest that the murder was carried out allegedly at the behest of dreaded gangster Jaggu Bhagwanpuria, currently lodged in Assam jail.

Notorious gangster and alleged drug lord Bhagwanpuria is also an accused in the killing of Punjabi singer Sidhu Moosewala. He was detained under the Prevention of Illicit Traffic in Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances (PIT-NDPS) Act earlier this year and shifted to Silchar

jail from Punjab by the Narcotics Control Bureau.

Immediately after the brutal killing of Dharamjit, a social media post immediately went viral in which gangsters associated with Jaggu Bhagwanpuria claimed responsibility. However, police said that the matter was still under investigation and nothing can be ruled out at this moment.

In December 2012, ASI Ravinder Singh was shot dead in Chheharta in front of his daughter, in which the then Akali leader Ranjit Singh Rana, who was harassing his daughter, was the prime accused. Dharma was also with him at that time. Both were convicted and sentenced to life imprisonment in the case.

Dharma, who had been granted parole multiple times in the past, was released on September 12 this time. On Thursday night, after returning home from meeting friends in his car, he was ambushed outside his residence. According to eyewitnesses, the assailants had been conducting a recce of his movements. While one youth kept the motorcycle engine switched on, the other two got down and opened indiscriminate fire, killing Dharma on the spot.

Chheharta SHO Vinod Sharma said that the police have launched a manhunt to nab the suspects and eight teams were analysing the CCTV cameras apart from conducting raids to nab the accused.