LUCKNOW: Cracking the murder of Vishwa Hindu Mahasabha (VHM) head Ranjeet Bachchan, Lucknow police arrested three persons, including Bachchan’s second wife and her paramour establishing a conspiracy theory as the reason behind the sensational killing here on Thursday.
While sharing the details of the case and the investigation conducted into it by the police, Lucknow Police Commissioner (PC) Sujit Pandey said that those arrested for the crime included deceased’s second wife Smriti Srivastava, her paramour Dipendra and one Sanjit Gautam, who was driving the vehicle used in crime on the day of murder. However, Jitendra the shooter of Rajneet Bachchan, was
yet to be arrested and the weapon used in killing was yet to be recovered.
"We have recovered two bullet shells and a bullet from the spot of crime. Two shots were fired from a .32 bore pistol hitting the deceased in his head and his cousin Aditya in hand, " said the police commissioner. Aditya was accompanying Ranjeet while he was shot during a morning stroll in the heart of the city on Sunday morning.
As per the Police Commissioner, Smriti’s hatred for Ranjeet Bachchan led her to plot his murder in collusion with her paramour Dipendra. Pandey claimed that the probe indicated that Smriti and Dipendra wanted to marry each other but Ranjeet was proving to be a hurdle in their path as he was not ready to divorce Smriti. In fact, a case of marital discord and divorce involving Smriti and Ranjeet
has been pending in a family court in Lucknow since 2016.
While Smriti was arrested from her house in state capital, Dipendra was picked up from UP-MP border. Sanjit Gautam was arrested from Mohanlalganj area on Lucknow outskirts on Thursday afternoon. The cops were making all out efforts to nab shooter Jitendra, a cousin of Dipendra, said the police commissioner.
While explaining the sequence of events, Pandey said that Ranjeet had publicly slapped Smriti on the middle of a road in Lucknow on January 17, which happened to be their marriage anniversary. “Bachchan wanted to take Smriti for dinner but she refused. That irked Ranjeet who slapped her on the road. This infuriated Dipendra who decided to eliminate Ranjeet,” said the police commissioner.
The cop claimed that the deceased had two wives. Currently, he was living with his first wife Kalindi Nirmal Sharma, who is a government employee. The police commissioner claimed that 12 teams of cops were pressed into action to crack the case and conduct the probe considering various aspects related to
the life of victim. He added that police had recreated the scene with the help of all the incriminatory evidence to stitch the sequence of events together and crack the case. He said that three people, picked from Gorakhpur were being quizzed in connection with Bachchan’s property disputes while Rae Bareli businessman was being questioned in connection with dispute related to fixing of one of his family member’s marriage.
The official said the Gorakhpur realtor and his two associates had strong motive to eliminate Bachchan but so far there were no concrete evidences against him to prove his involvement. He said that the police team was further verifying their links with a criminal gang of Gorakhpur.
Meanwhile, one police team of crime branch has been camping in Agra after CCTV footages showed two suspected shooters fleeing towards west Uttar Pradesh after committing the crime. Besides, two teams of UP Special Task Force (STF) are also trying to identify the suspected shooters to nab the mastermind behind the murder.
Bachchan, 40, president of VHM and a resident of Gorakhpur, was on a morning walk along with his maternal cousin, Aditya Srivastava, when a man fired at them on the pavement of the Globe Park in Hazratganj at around 6.15 am. The attacker had fled after firing at Ranjeet’s face, killing him on the spot. His cousin was injured in the shooting.