Lucknow: The accused in the Baba Siddique murder case used Instagram to communicate and coordinate before and after the NCP leader was shot dead in Mumbai last month, sources in the Uttar Pradesh Police told ThePrint after questioning the third shooter, identified as Shiv Kumar Gautam, who was arrested Sunday in a joint operation of the Mumbai crime branch and the Uttar Pradesh Special Task Force (STF).
Besides Gautam, who, according to the police, was planning to escape to Nepal, four residents of UP’s Kaiserganj have been arrested for assisting him with shelter in Bahraich, where he stayed upon absconding after the murder, and trying to help him in his attempt to flee to Nepal.
The STF said that Gautam, along with the four—identified as Anurag Kashyap, Gyan Prakash ‘Omu’, Akash Srivastava and Akhilendra Pratap Singh—was arrested from a location near the Hara Basahri river in Nanpara in Bahraich. Anurag is the brother of another one of Siddique’s assailants, Dharmraj Kashyap, who was arrested soon after the murder.
The Mumbai Police had sought assistance from the UP STF in arresting Gautam and the others via a letter dated October 23.
Notably, the four accomplices had been booked for allegedly molesting a 15-year-old girl in Kaiserganj in July this year. Three of them, except Akhilendra, were arrested in that case. While Anurag, Gyan Prakash and Akash were released on bail after two weeks, Akhilendra, who had absconded, had obtained a stay on the arrest from the Allahabad High Court.
‘Was promised Rs 10 lakh for murder’
In a statement issued in connection with Sunday’s arrest, the UP STF said that Gautam and Dharmraj hail from the same village in Bahraich. Gautam was a scrap worker in Pune.
“His shop was next to the shop of his handler, Shubham Lonkar. For about one-two months before the murder, they had been staying in Mumbai’s Kurla area in a rented accommodation and then travelled to Pune after committing the crime,” Deputy Superintendent of Police Pramesh Kumar Shukla told ThePrint.
According to STF’s statement, Lonkar, a member of Lawrence Bishnoi’s gang, facilitated a conversation between Gautam and the jailed gangster’s brother, Anmol Bishnoi, via the Snapchat application.
UP Additional Director General of Police (law and order, and STF) Amitabh Yash told ThePrint, “We have interrogated him, along with Mumbai Police. He has said that Lonkar made him speak to Anmol Bishnoi over Snapchat, but his statements need to be verified. He also travelled to UP via train,” he said.
“In connection with Baba Siddique’s murder, Gautam said that he was promised Rs 10 lakh after the murder, and was also assured of some monthly help over and above that. He said that the mobile SIM and cartridges were provided to them by Shubham Lonkar and Mohammed Yaseen Akhtar. New mobile phones and SIM cards were provided to the shooters to communicate with each other after the murder,” the statement said, detailing what Gautam told the STF upon interrogation.
“We had been recceing around Baba Siddique for the past few months, and killed him on 12 October after getting a chance. Since it was a festival, the area was crowded, which is why two were arrested, but I managed to flee,” the statement quoted Gautam as saying.
An STF officer told ThePrint, “Gautam threw his phone somewhere and travelled to Pune, from where he travelled to Jhansi and Lucknow to reach Bahraich.”
The STF has further revealed that when Gautam spoke to Anurag using the phone of a train passenger, the latter informed him that Akhilendra, Gyan Prakash and Akash had made preparations for him to leave for Nepal.
“This is why I came to Bahraich and was about to escape to Nepal with my accomplices. Others, too, supported this,” STF said in its statement, quoting Gautam’s confession.
In the FIR lodged on 17 July in the molestation case against Gautam’s accomplices, the four were booked under sections 115 (2) (voluntarily causing hurt), 74 (outraging modesty of a woman) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS) and sections 7 and 8 of the Protection of Children from Sexual Offences (POCSO) Act.
The minor’s father told ThePrint, “My wife and daughter were walking on the road on Muharram day. There was a lot of crowd there. My daughter was molested and the accused beat up my wife, too. The passersby saved them. Three were arrested, while Akhilendra absconded.”
(Edited by Mannat Chugh)
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