PATNA: A youth wing leader of BJP was shot dead by unidentified criminals in Jharkhand’s Gumla district late on Saturday night, sparking protests by local residents who blocked the Ranchi-Gumla highway for hours on Sunday.
Vicky Sahu, 28, received three bullets – one in his head and two in the chest – at Laji-Silafari Bazar and died on the spot. Local residents who rushed out of their homes after hearing the sound of gunshots said the assailants fled in a Bolero car. Sahu was the Gumla block president of Bharatiya Janata Yuva Morcha (BJYM), the youth wing of the state’s ruling BJP.
This being the second murder of a BJP leader in the state in a week, the saffron party’s leaders said their workers and leaders were being targeted by anti-social elements feeling frustrated by the rapid development work being undertaken by the Raghubar Das-led state government.
On March 11 morning, Pankaj Gupta, the treasurer of BJP’s Lohardaga district unit, was shot dead outside an eatery under Nagri police station area of Ranchi district. He was shot in the head and chest when he was standing outside the eatery, and the murder act was caught on CCTV camera. A Special Investigation Team (SIT) formed probing the murder detained and interrogated nearly 60 hardcore criminals from across Ranchi, but nobody has been arrested yet.
Sources said Sahu, who worked as a contractor in the sand mining sector, had left his house on his Scooty at about 10 PM to engage in a bout of gambling with his friends. He lost all the money he placed in gambling and was returning home when he was shot dead, according to villagers.
Police on Sunday detained four people after Sahu’s brother, Janak Sahu, raised suspicion on them and began interrogating them. Gumla SP Anshuman Kumar, who visited the site of the murder and spoke to several villagers, said an investigation is on and the killers would be arrested soon.