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25-yr-old, training to be teacher, held for selling pistol to Jamia shooter
Police identified the suspect as Ajeet, who is pursuing a course from a UP University to become a teacher. He was picked up from his home in Shajpur village near Jewar in UP’s Greater Noida.
A 25-year-old from Uttar Pradesh has been arrested by Delhi Police on a charge of selling a country-made pistol to the Jewar teenager who opened fire at protesters outside Jamia Millia Islamia, a senior police officer told Hindustan Times on Monday. A postgraduate student at Jamia was injured in the firing on Thursday.
Police identified the suspect as Ajeet, who is pursuing a course from a UP University to become a teacher. He was picked up from his home in Shajpur village near Jewar in UP’s Greater Noida.
“He has completed his graduation in Arts and is pursuing his B.Ed degree course from a university in Uttar Pradesh,” the officer said, adding that they will not arrest the teenager’s relative, as he was unaware of his firing plans.
Ajeet has also claimed to have won a junior wrestling championship in the 32-kg category. “We are verifying it,” a police officer said.
“We have just completed the legal formalities to arrest Ajeet. We have booked him under the appropriate sections of law,” said deputy commissioner of police (crime) Rajesh Deo, who heads the team probing the firing case.
The teenager, who was remanded in protective custody at a correction home for juveniles, had told the police that he bought the pistol for Rs 10,000 with the help of his relative, said an investigator.
“The investigating team caught the teenager’s relative. His questioning revealed that the teenager had asked him to help him procure a pistol on the pretext of using it for celebratory firing during his cousin’s wedding on Thursday night itself. He took him to Ajeet, who gave him the gun and took Rs 10,000 for it,” the investigator said.
Police alleged that Ajeet had confessed to selling the illegal gun to the teenager and contended that he sold him the weapon because it was needed for “celebratory firing” during the cousin’s wedding.
Investigators said that Ajeet has claimed that he had procured the gun from another man in his village. However, he has not been able to identify him, making the police believe that he is trying to mislead them by spilling the beans on someone else.
The 17-year-old had told the police that his original plan was to go to Shaheen Bagh, where people are protesting against the Citizenship (Amendment) Act , but an autorickshaw driver dropped him off at the university campus.
The teenager from Jewar in Greater Noida was sent to 28-day protective custody by a Juvenile Justice Board (JJB) on Friday.
According to the police, the teenager told them his original plan was to “fire in the air” at Shaheen Bagh and “become famous”.
“He told us he panicked, feared getting lynched, and fired at the crowd when he saw some of them rushing towards him soon after they saw him brandishing a gun and threatening to shoot them”, said another investigator, requesting anonymity.
Police said the minor, who will take his class 12 board exams next month, showed no signs of remorse while in their custody for nearly 24 hours.
Investigators said he was “self-radicalised” by watching news and videos on social media regarding the murders of some Hindu leaders like Chandan Gupta and Kamlesh Tiwari, and anti-CAA protests in Shaheen Bagh.
Gupta was killed in Kasganj on January 26, 2018 while Tiwari was murdered at his house in Lucknow in October last year.
DCP Deo said they had sent a request to the Ram Manohar Lohia hospital in national capital Delhi to set up a panel of doctors to conduct the teenager’s bone ossification test to authenticate his claims that he is below 18 years.
