KURUKSHETRA: Unidentified assailants fatally shot a liquor contractor at Shahabad in Haryana's Kurukshetra district, police said on Saturday.
Shantanu was shot dead near Meena Market on the national highway in Shahabad, 20 km from here, on Friday evening, they said.
The victim briefly stopped his car to buy some items when two men on a sports bike pumped seven bullets into him, police said.
Eyewitnesses told police that the attackers fired about eight rounds before fleeing.
As panic spread on the busy highway, bystanders attempted to stop the shooters, who abandoned their bike, ran across the road, snatched a motorcycle at gunpoint and fled towards Ambala on the wrong side of the highway.
Shantanu was rushed to Adesh Hospital, where doctors declared him dead on arrival.
SP Nitish Aggarwal told PTI that he reached the crime scene with a police team along with DSP Ram Kumar and Shahabad SHO Satish Kumar.
A case has been registered, and security has been tightened with blockades on all major routes and city borders as the search for the killers continues, he said.
The SP said the victim, originally from a village in Jhajjar district, was living in Shahbad for sometime.
Investigators have collected forensic evidence, questioned the shopkeepers, and began scanning CCTV footage from Meena Market and its nearby areas, the officer said.
Police have found some clues and are hopeful for a breakthrough in the matter soon, he said.
Checking has been intensified along the borders with Punjab, Himachal Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh, with multiple teams dispatched to the nearby regions, including Ambala, Saha, and Barara.
A police officer said preliminary investigation suggests the murder could be linked to an old rivalry or a dispute in liquor trade.