WEAPON USED IN CRIME RECOVERED

KASAULI (SOLAN) : The Himachal Pradesh Police said on Friday that the weapon used to kill assistant town planner Shail Bala Sharma here has been recovered.

“A .32 bore revolver has been recovered from a retaining wall around 15-metre from the crime spot,”said Solan officiating superintendent of police (SP) Shiv Kumar while briefing media in Dharampur.

The accused had fired three gun shots, of which one hit the slain assistant town planner, Kasauli, another the PWD worker Gulab Singh, who is being treated at the Postgraduate Institute of Medical Education and Research (PGIMER), while the third was the open fire.

The police, while narrating accused’s version said he was in the same jungle and around 1am on Wednesday, he came towards his house and hide his weapon and descended to the Shimlakalka national highway.”

On being asked how the accused managed to evade the heavy police arrangement, the officiating SP said, “There was a rumour of gunshot near Kanda village which is other side of the high way (the side where the accused had initially escaped towards). Around 70% force was deployed to comb the forest.”

Accused told police that he took a lift, and then boarded a bus till Tribune Chowk in Chandigarh and then took another lift to Jahangirpuri in New Delhi. “He shaved moustache, trim hairs to change his appearance in Jahangirpuri,” he said.

Later, he took a bus to reach Mathura, where he was hiding in a temple, police said. He asked a rickshaw driver for phone and texted to his cousin Hira Thakur, who runs a school in Mandodhar in Kasauli, that he wanted to surrender.

However, the police said, “We traced him through the telephonic communication as he made two-three calls. He kept changing his locations but did not use his own phone.” Cops said, “If he wanted to surrender he could have surrendered as he was few kilometers far from Mathura police station.”