New Delhi: A 17-member Delhi Police team worked for three weeks, leaning on electronic surveillance and a bevy of inputs from their human intelligence network to narrow in on the men who were involved in the Burger King shootout last month, investigators aware of the matter said on Saturday, a day after three men were shot in an exchange of fire with officers in Sonipat, Haryana.
Burger King shootout in Delhi’s Rajouri Garden took place last month (Sanchit Khanna/ Hindustan Times)
The three men were headed for a village five kilometres away, to extort Rs.50 lakh from a local doctor for their gang leader, fugitive Portugal-based gangster Himanshu Bhau, when they were waylaid by the raiding team, two police officers who were part of the encounter said on Saturday.
The gangsters and police exchanged 43 bullets during the shootout.
A member of Bhau’s gang had tipped off the Delhi Police crime branch team about their plan, leading officers to the three men – Ashish Lalu, Vikas (also known as Vicky Ridhana) and Sunny Kharar (also known as Gujjar). The informer’s identity has been withheld and he has been assured police protection.
Ashish and Vicky were involved in the June 18 shooting at Rajouri Garden in which a rival gang member – 26-year-old Aman Joon – was shot dead inside a Burger King outlet that was packed with more than 60 people. Their associate Bijender Singh alias Golo, who brought them to the Burger King on his motorcycle, was arrested in the last week of June by the special cell of Delhi Police after a brief resistance in Rohini area, police said. Investigators said they are still looking for Anu Dhankar, the woman who allegedly lured Joon to the restaurant.
“The video clip showed that Joon jumped across the billing counter to save his life. The attackers followed him and continued firing at him. They fired around 25 rounds from a close range, killing Joon at the spot. A case of murder and firing was registered at the Rajouri Garden police station. Later the Bhau gang took responsibility for Joon’s killing through a social media post,” said a special cell officer aware of the case.
The motives
A senior crime branch officer, who asked not to be named, said an objective of shooting, apart from eliminating a rival, was to also issue a “warning” to the city’s business community, said Delhi Police officers.
Five or six businessmen in Delhi have already received extortion threats from Bhau and his aide, Sahil Ritolia, who is also hiding in a foreign country, over the past few weeks.
Before the Burger King shooting, their gang-members had already executed a shootout at Fusion Cars, a used car showroom in Tilak Nagar, and later demanded ₹5 crore as extortion money, the officer said.
Special commissioner of police (crime) Shalini Singh said that after the Burger King murder, the crime branch’s RK Puram team began collecting information about the three suspects. Bijender was arrested by the special cell 10 days after the shooting.
“Our crime branch team members remained on the ground for more than three weeks, collecting information about Ashish and Vicky,” she said. The team visited Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, and Haryana in search of the suspects, but in vain.
The final action
On July 12, said Singh, the team received a tip-off that the two suspects, and their associates, will travel through Kharkhoda village in Sonipat in a Kia Seltos.
A 17-member crime branch team led by deputy commissioner of police (crime) Amit Goel was dispatched to Sonepat in the afternoon. They informed the Haryana police and its special task force (STF) was directed to join the raid.
Around 8pm, some members of the crime branch spotted the white car in which the three were travelling and began tailing it. Half an hour or so later, in a bid to escape, they sped on to Rohtak-Chinauli Road, walking straight into a trap laid by STF and other crime branch personnel. “Seeing the police presence ahead, the suspects turned the vehicle towards an unpaved road, but their car got stuck in the muck. All three first fired at police from inside the car and then stepped out. They were warned to stop firing and surrender. But they paid no heed and police responded,” said Singh.
Of the 19 rounds fired by the personnel, at least 11 hit the three gangsters, killing them on the spot. Ashish and Vicky were hit by three bullets each in the head, neck and chest, and Sunny was hit by five in the head and chest. The assailants fired 24 rounds, of which one hit DCP Goel, who was leading the police operation, on his bullet-proof vest. DCP Goel said Ashish has been involved in 18 serious crimes, including murder, extortion, rioting, and assault on police personnel, while Vicky and Sunny had three and four cases against them respectively.
Karn Pratap Singh has been writing on crime, policing, and issues of safety in Delhi for almost a decade. He covers high-intensity spot news, including terror strikes, serial blasts and security threats in the national capital.Read More
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