Gurugram shooter mentally sound, motive still unclear
Judge’s wife succumbs to injuries, son battling for life
GURUGRAM: The police said on Sunday they were trying to ascertain why the personal security office (PSO) of an additional sessions judge shot his wife and son in a busy Gurugram area, causing the death of the woman and leaving the 18-year-old boy in a serious condition at a hospital.
The PSO, who left the crime scene at Arcadia market in Gurugram’s Sector 49 without being challenged by dozens of onlookers, was arrested two hours after the shooting from the Gurugram-Faridabad road on Saturday.
Head constable Mahipal Singh (32) was terminated from duty on Sunday on the order of police commissioner KK Rao and sent to police custody for four days by a city court, deputy commissioner of police (crime) Sumit Kuhar said. He said the mental condition of the accused appeared to be stable. Singh had said after his arrest that he felt he was “possessed” at the time he fired his service revolver.
The DCP said Singh told interrogators that judge Krishan Kant’s family members – Ritu Garg (38) and Dhruv (18) – were “devils”. “When police asked why he was calling them devils, Singh said that being a devil means being a dirty person. He was aggressive during the initial hours of interrogation,” Kuhar said. The accused said he was illtreated by Dhruv, who would ask Singh to run personal errands, according to Kuhar. “The accused and his wife often used to fight and had an estranged relationship for the last two years. He had phoned his mother, too, after he shot Ritu and Dhruv,” the police officer added.
GURUGRAM: Mahipal Singh, 32, who shot the wife and son of an additional sessions judge on Saturday, used to spend “four to six hours daily” browsing the internet, the police said on Sunday. It also said that Singh had been ‘disturbed’ for the past one-and-a half months and had apologised to the judge twice for his ‘weird’ behaviour.
Singh shot Ritu, 38, and Dhruv, 18 — wife and son of additional sessions judge Krishan Kant — in a crowded market in Gurugram. Singh was the personal security guard of judge Kant. While Ritu succumbed to her injuries on Saturday night, Dhruv remained critical.
The police are yet to ascertain the motive behind the shooting which had shocked the city police and kept the force on its toes for at least two hours before Singh was arrested. Head constable Singh, whose services from the state police were terminated on Sunday, was produced before a local court on Sunday. He was sent to four-day police custody. However, the police had sought a week’s custody for interrogation of Singh to establish the shooting’s motive.
Deputy commissioner of police Sumit Kuhar said, the investigators are looking into Singh’s past life and affiliations to understand why he committed the crime. Kuhar said Singh was particularly active on social media and liked to post videos on the Facebook. He said Singh had two Facebook profiles, both of them with the name, ‘Mahipalji’.
Mahipal joined the Haryana Police in 2007. He had two daughters with his wife Vias Devi alias Meenu. Some family members claimed that the couple had a strained relationship over the birth of two daughters, said Kuhar.
However, Singh’s neighbours never reported any unusual behaviour and described him as a well-mannered man. He had moved to Gurugram four-and-ahalf years ago and had been posted as a personal security officer for four years with many judges.
Kuhar said Singh was close to his daughters and often took them out and used to make their videos and upload them on Facebook and shared them with his relatives on WhatsApp.
After his father’s death, Singh started living with his maternal uncle in Bhungarka village in Narnaul and studied at a government school. It was his uncle who motivated Singh to become a police officer. He made Singh to take up coaching for the exam to join the police force.
Kuhar also said that Singh had been watching videos related to religion and it is suspected that he had been attending ‘conversion’ camps. However, HT could not independently verify the claim. The police also could not explain as to how his alleged attendance at such camps could be connected to Saturday’s shooting.
In the video footage of the incident recorded by a witness, Mahipal is seen with the gun in his hand. He was also seen trying to push Dhruv inside the car as he laid listless on the road.
The body of Ritu was taken to her native town Hisar on Sunday, but was brought back and has been kept at the mortuary.
COUNSELLORS TO WORK WITH COPS
DCP Kuhar said the state government has decided to appoint counsellors in all districts who will work with the cops deployed as personal security guards to VIPs. Sources said that most cops employed in such roles lead stressful and frustrating lives that leads to suicide.
Speaking on the sidelines of a programme in Karnal, Haryana chief minister Manohar Lal Khattar told reporters, “Their (the security personnel’s) counselling will be done...and time to time such counselling should be done.”
On Saturday, Khattar had expressed shock over the incident and summoned the Haryana home secretary and the state director general of police.