The Asian Age

Wanted criminal carrying `5 lakh reward arrested

- AGE CORESPONDE­NT

Delhi’s most wanted criminal, Sonu Dariyapur, 38, who was involved in more than 10 cases of murder, extortion, abduction and Arms Act in Delhi and Haryana, has been arrested on Thursday following a brief exchange of fire, the police said.

Mr Sonu alias Satyawan, 38, who is carrying a `five lakh reward on his head, was also involved in a shootout on April 30 to murder his arch-nemesis gangster Monu Dariyapur.

His personal security officers, Delhi Police assistant sub inspector Vijay Kumar and constable Kuldeep, and two others, Arun Shastri and Yogesh, were also attacked in the outer Delhi's Mianwali Nagar.

The team nabbed Mr Sonu and seized his pistol which was found loaded with 13 live cartridges. After searching his car, the police also found another countrymad­e English pistol loaded with four live cartridges from underneath the driver seat.

Some armed men, including Mr Sonu, had fired more than three dozen bullets leading to the deaths of Mr Monu, Mr Kumar and Mr Shastri and injuring the other two.

Mr Monu was previously a member of Mr Sonu’s gang. Both of them were friends, but their relationsh­ip turned bitter after Mr Monu fell in love with Mr Sonu’s cousin and, subsequent­ly, married her. Enraged at the alliance, Mr Sonu had vowed to kill Mr Monu.

A team of Delhi police's special cell had been been working for the past few months to arrest Mr Sonu. The police also kept tabs on his social media profiles, created in fictitious names.

A police officer privy to the investigat­ion said that he used to interact with his accomplice­s through Facebook Messenger. He had also created a Facebook account in a fake name.

For calls, he mainly used WhatsApp in order to avoid his calls being intercepte­d by the police. Mr Sonu also used the Telegram app to interact with his gang members, the police officer said. In the past four months, several police teams were sent across Punjab, Rajasthan, Himachal Pradesh, and Uttar Pradesh to nab the elusive Mr Sonu.

 ?? — BIPLAB BANERJEE ?? NREGA beneficiar­ies protest against the alleged attempts of the government to dilute the scheme in New Delhi on Thursday.
— BIPLAB BANERJEE NREGA beneficiar­ies protest against the alleged attempts of the government to dilute the scheme in New Delhi on Thursday.

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