Rajasthan: Murder case against govt deputy chief whip Mahendra Choudhary, others
The family of the murder victim has alleged that government deputy chief whip Mahendra Choudhary was one of the conspirators behind the attack.
JAIPUR: The family of a trader, shot dead on Saturday by unidentified assailants in Nawa town of Nagaur, has accused the government’s deputy chief whip Mahendra Choudhary of being one of the conspirators behind the attack even as the MLA called the allegations baseless and politically motivated.
A case against Choudhary and seven others has been lodged at Nawa police station under IPC sections 302 (murder) 120B (criminal conspiracy) and other relevant sections after the deceased trader’s wife lodged an FIR.
Nearly half-a-dozen miscreants opened fire at Jaipal Poonia, a salt business trader, when he was going in his car to the court for a hearing. The miscreants in a SUV stopped him and opened indiscriminate firing leading to profuse bleeding, said police. The deceased had many criminal cases against him.
In the FIR lodged by the victim’s wife, she alleged that on directions of Mahendra Choudhary, MLA from Nawa, and his brother Moti Singh, Moolchand Saini, Virendra Saini and others killed her husband.
“My husband left home at 10.30am for court on Saturday but returned at 11am, saying that the hearing of the case will be at 12.30pm. While having lunch, he told me that the MLA and others are conspiring against him and trying to implicate him in a false case. And that he is getting threats and may be killed,” she said.
According to his wife, the deceased for the last many years had been working for the protection of Sambhar Lake, and recently also got a job as a security officer. “He was not allowing illegal borewell and encroachment, which was not taken well by these people and they started implicating him in false cases,” she said.
“He left home at 12.30pm for court, and at around 3.15pm, I got a call from the phone of Rajendra Sen, who connected me to Jaipal. He told me that at around 2 -2.15pm, when he was returning from court a SUV blocked his way and masked men opened fire,” said his wife.
Commenting on the allegations, Choudhary said, “All the charges are baseless and politically motivated.”
Meanwhile, the Rashtriya Loktantrik Party (RLP) leader and Nagaur MP Hanuman Beniwal has demanded a Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) probe into the case.
Beniwal said such an incident shows the criminals’ lack of fear of the police. The MP alleged that in places like Nawan, Kuchaman etc., the police officers along with the local MLA and his family are running a parallel government, as a result of which there is a steady increase in heinous crimes.
He said due to the failure of the government and weak administrative system in Rajasthan, the common man is feeling unsafe
