Why didn’t police keep a tab on dreaded criminal?

You would think a notorious criminal accused of committing more than 23 crimes, including murder, attempt to murder and robbery, and having served two jail terms, deserved to be monitored closely to pre-empt any further strike.

Well, the Delhi Police either didn’t, or just couldn’t manage to keep track of Om Prakash alias Bunty’s movements in the last few months when he was rebuilding his gang. The result: Four Delhiites paid for the inability with their lives.

Police on Wednesday officially confirmed the recent terror streak in Madangir, Amar Colony, Andrews Ganj and Sangam Vihar by motorcycle-borne, gun-totting men, in which four men were killed and two injured, were the handiwork of a five-member gang led by Bunty. All of them were at large till Wednesday evening, police said.

After being released from jail in February this year, Bunty took his time to model a gang of his choice without the police getting a whiff of it, managed to procure firearms unchecked and unleash a terror streak in south Delhi this month.

Bunty is a ‘bad character’, a policing jargon for criminals with a substantial criminal history, of Sangam Vihar police station. That didn’t though stop him from murdering a cable operator, Gurmeet Singh, in Sangam Vihar on July 5, the gang’s first crime this month.

So, was it an intelligence failure of the Delhi Police that led to the recent killings? “More than that, it can even be termed as plain ignorance,” said Ajay Raj Sharma, former Delhi Police Commissioner. “Had the police been alert, Bunty couldn’t have dared to regroup in the same area where police should ideally have been on his look out.”