Jha was shot dead by two assailants at Shaktigarh here beside the NH-19 on 1 April evening on his way to Kolkata accompanying Bratin and Sheikh Abdul Latif,
Representational Image (Photo: Getty Images)
An Uttar Pradesh-based gangster currently lodged inside the Loknayak Jay Prakash Narayan Central Jail in Hazaribagh in Jharkhand is believed to have assigned the sharpshooters to kill coal mafia Rajesh Jha and the SP, East Burdwan yesterday called up the Jail Superintendent to inquire about him.
Tomorrow, the Special Investigation Team constituted to probe the murder, has summoned one Prince Khan of Basukinath town in Dumka district of Jharkhand for interrogation in connection with Jha’s murder, the district police sources said.
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Prince, once a close aide of Jha had a falling out due to certain differences of opinion a few years back.
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After recording the statements of Bratin Mukherjee – Jha’s aide who was with the deceased at the time of the murder, the SIT has been sending summons to Jha’s gang members one after another, aiming to ascertain the actual motive behind the murder.
Jha was shot dead by two assailants at Shaktigarh here beside the NH-19 on 1 April evening on his way to Kolkata accompanying Bratin and Sheikh Abdul Latif, a CBI charge-sheeted fugitive in cross-border cattle smuggling case.
While Sheikh disappeared after the shooting, the SIT believes that the hefty extortion money collected daily from the legal coal transporters was the motive behind the shootout.
“A gangster currently lodged inside the Hazaribagh jail has ambitions to take control of the coal loading Railway siding in Pandaveswar. He has got a pool of nearly 150 goons and has a similar record of trying to take control over the neighbouring Jharia Coalfields in Jharkhand,” an SIT official said.
The sharpshooters, police came to know, escaped using the Katwa route to go back to Bihar using either Birbhum or Murshidabad as corridor in a white Maruti-make SUV.
The SIT officials said: “The fleeing SUV was last spotted at Pattabadi crossing in Jharkhand where two roads on the right and left lead towards Bhagalpur and Dumka. After that, we’ve got no clue in which direction it went.”
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