3 held for eatery owner’s murder

LUCKNOW : Police have arrested three people in connection with the murder of eatery owner Deepu Verma,35, who was shot dead by two unidentified motorcycle-borne criminals in Sadar locality on September 21. Probe revealed that the deceased as well as one of the accused were involved in cannabis trade.

The three accused, identified as Dilip Kumar, 48, Rajeev Ranjan Shrivastava, 21 and Adarsh Kumar Shrivastava, 20, were arrested from Cantt on Thursday night. Ranjan is a BSc third year student in Gonda. Police had intelligence input that accused were coming to collect the money from Dilip and return his gun.

SSP Lucknow Kalanidhi Naithani said that Deepu who ran an eatery in Sadar was involved in drug trade with Dilip Kumar. “During questioning, Kumar conceded that Deepu was asking for Rs 20, 000 / month or partnership in drug trade,” he said. To get rid of his increasing demands, Dilip decided to kill Deepu and talked to his friend Rajeev Ranjan Shrivastava. Rajeev agreed to kill Deepu for Rs. 50, 000.

Dilip also told the police that he gave a .32 bore pistol (illegal weapon) and cartridges to Rajeev. On September 21 night, Rajeev and his friend Adarsh went to Deepu’s eatery and opened fire. “Deepu was shot by Rajeev Ranjan Shrivastava,” Naithani added.

After the incident, police recorded statements of around 50 people and also scanned CCTV footage, which suggested that the assailants were riding a red bike with ‘X’ mark on its oil tank. During probe, cops came to know that such a bike was used by Dilip’s friend. When cops probed into Dilip’s background, they found the drug trade link between him and the deceased.