Indian police arrest hard-line Hindu activist for journalist’s murder

NEW DELHI: Indian police arrested a member of a hardline Hindu group on Friday for the murder of a journalist late last year, officials said.

KT Naveen Kumar was arrested on suspicion of supplying the weapons used to kill Gauri Lankesh, according to a senior police officer, who asked not to be identified because he was not authorised to talk to media. More arrests are expected, he said.

Lankesh, the editor and publisher of the Kannadalanguage newspaper Gauri Lankesh Patrike, was shot dead outside her home in the southern city of Bengaluru in September.

The murder of Lankesh, a staunch advocate of secularism and critic of right-wing political ideology, sparked protests across India.

Kumar, according to the police official, was a member of a hard-line Hindu group called the Sanatan Sanstha. The group was earlier accused of being involved in the murder of a well-known atheist. Officials at Sanatan Sanstha were not immediately available for comment.—