Three employees of CNG station in Gurugram stabbed to death, police say probe on

Unidentified assailants on Monday stabbed the trio to death at a CNG station on the service lane off National Highway 48 in Sector 31, said the police, adding that they have ruled out robbery as the motive as cash at the station was untouched.

Three employees of a compressed natural gas (CNG) filling station on a service lane off National Highway 48 in Sector 31 were stabbed to death by unidentified assailants in the early hours of Monday, police said, adding that they had ruled out robbery as the motive as cash at the station was largely untouched.

Policemen investigating the triple murder at a CNG gas station on NH-48, Gurugram. (Vipin Kumar/HT PHOTO)

According to the police, the incident took place around 2.45am when the three employees were sleeping in the manager’s room. The perpetrators switched off the lights and disabled CCTV cameras on the premises minutes before the incident, said police.

Police said that the assailants stabbed the victims--Pushpendra Singh, the manager of the pump, Naresh Kumar, a filler at the pump, and Bhupender Kumar, an operator--all of whom were on the night shift, and fled.

Police said they received a call from staff at the adjacent petrol pump after a severely injured Bhupender raised an alarm by running towards the pump. He collapsed and died before he could reach the place.

According to Dr Deepak Mathur, the forensic expert who conducted the autopsy, said that the men suffered different kinds of injuries so the use of more than one weapon could not be ruled out. “Pushpendra suffered eight stab injuries, Bhupender 10, and Naresh was stabbed over 12 times. The cause of death was excessive bleeding. All of them were stabbed in the neck and chest, but Naresh was stabbed brutally in the abdomen too. The weapons also seem to be of different sizes,” he said.

Preet Pal Sangwan, assistant commissioner of police (crime), said that when they reached the spot, they found Bhupender’s body lying in a pool of blood outside the petrol pump and the two others in the manager’s room inside the gas station. “The assailants seemed to be aware of the layout. They first switched off the main power connection from the board installed near the generator and then went to the manager’s room. We suspect that they entered from the rear of the station,” he said.

Sangwan said staff at the adjacent petrol pump saw Bhupender running towards them but didn’t know he was an employee of the other station. “The staff thought that he was a commuter, and someone had shot at him,” he said.

Sangwan said the police were scanning the CCTV cameras installed on the stretch to identify the perpetrators. “We cannot rule out the role of an insider or a former employee. We are working on all angles. There is a dhaba nearby which is operational all night and we are questioning a few people,” he said.

Police said the entire incident took place within three minutes according to the footage from CCTV cameras installed at the adjacent petrol pump.

Mohammad Arman, a tea vendor who runs a kiosk at the gas station, said that he was sleeping at the kiosk when the incident took place. “The road is noisy throughout the night. I was fast asleep and thought I heard screaming, but did not get up. It was the police who woke me up and informed me about the three murders,” he said.

Police also informed Prashant Gulati, the owner of the station, who reached the spot and checked to see if any of the money had been taken.

Gulati said most of the money was intact--only ₹5,000 were missing. “The amount was too small to mention in the FIR. Naresh had returned from his village on Sunday after three weeks. Our station has been closed at night since the lockdown and the employees were sleeping in the office on Sunday night as they had to start operations at 5am,” he said.

A case under sections 302 (murder) and 34 (common intention) of the Indian Penal Code was registered against unidentified persons on Monday at Sector 40 police station.

Meanwhile, the victims’ family members said they were stumped as to why their relatives were targeted.

Bhupender’s father Ramesh Chand said his son used to live in a rented room in Jharsa village. “No one has any clue about the incident and even the police are not disclosing anything to us,” he said.

Pushpendra’s brother Sunny said that he had no personal or professional enmity with anyone. “We received a call from the police and reached the station,” he said.