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Father of Amritsar NRI’s former wife among five held for murder bid
Five people, including the victim's first wife's father, were arrested after an NRI was shot at his home in Amritsar. Police are still searching for two assailants.
A day after an NRI was shot at inside his house at Daburji village on the outskirts of Amritsar city, police on Sunday arrested five people, including the father of the victim’s first wife.
Efforts are being made to nab the two assailants who shot at Sukhchain Singh (43), who recently returned from the US, the police said.
Addressing the media, Amritsar police commissioner Ranjit Singh Dhillon said the attack on Sukhchain was carried out at the behest of the family of his first wife.
His first wife had committed suicide in December 2022 and her family nursed a grudge against him, he said.
Two assailants, Sukhwinder, alias Sukha, and Gurkirat Singh alias Guri, were hired to kill Sukhchain, the police said.
On Saturday morning, motorcycle-borne Sukhwinder and Gurkirat turned up at Sukhchain’s house and pulled out pistols and forcibly took him inside. After an argument, they fired three shots, two of which hit him. Sukhchain was rushed to a hospital in a critical condition. One bullet pierced into his head bypassing the brain and other hit his arm. According to doctors, he is out of danger now.
Those arrested have been identified as Sarwan Singh, the father of Sukhchain’s first wife and a resident of Bains village in Hoshiarpur, Jagjit Singh (29) and Chamkaur Singh (38) of Bhatth village in Tarn Taran, who helped the assailants before committing the crime, hotel owner Digambar Attri and hotel manager Abhilash Bhaskar, who provided accommodation to the assailants without asking for ID proofs, Dhillon said.
The assailants stayed in Attri’s hotel before and after committing the crime, the police said.
Dhillon said police have also booked US-based Sukhwinder Singh, Kuljinder Kaur and her husband Jasvir Singh. Sukhwinder and Kuljinder are the brother and sister of Sukhchain’s first wife.
The NRI was at in front of his second wife, mother and his two children from his first marriage. Footage retrieved from CCTV cameras installed inside the victim’s house showed his wife, mother and children pleading with the assailants to let him go.
“We have also tracked the bank transactions under which money was transferred from the US to the accused. We are working to track more bank entries. It is clear that the kin of NRI’s ex-wife hired persons in India to eliminate him,” Dhillon said.
“While Sarwan Singh and Nishan Kaur, parents of former wife of the NRI live in Bains Awan village in Hoshiarpur district, her brother Sukhwinder Singh, sister Kuljinder Kaur and sister’s husband Jasvir Singh live in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, US. A case under Sections 109,61 (2) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita and 25/27/54/59 of the Arms Act has been registered at the Maqboolpura police station.” Dhillon said.
