E-Paper
‘What did my son do?’, asks mother of Gopal Khemka murder accused on his encounter in Patna
Visibly rattled over the accused Vikas's encounter during a gunfight with the police, his mother was heard shouting, "What did my son do?"
Vikas alias Raja, a key accused in the murder of industrialist Gopal Khemka, was killed in a police encounter in Patna on Tuesday. When asked about his encounter, Vikas's mother lashed out and asked "what did my son do?".
Visibly rattled over Vikas's encounter during a gunfight with the police, his mother was heard shouting, "What did my son do?". When asked about the allegation that Vikas provided the weapon used for Khemka's killing, the accused's mother said, "He used to work in Chennai".
According to police, a team arrived at Vikas's house for questioning in Gopal Khemka's murder, which is when the accused opened fire, and was shot in an encounter.
"The connection of Raja is yet to be fully established, but the police had gone to question him for his dubious role, as he came across as a supplier of illegal weapons and he is suspected to have made available the weapon used in the murder," said Patna senior SP Kartikey Sharma.
Vikas is accused of providing the arms and ammunition for the murder at the behest of Umesh alias Vijay Yadav, who was picked up by the police on Monday from the same area in Patna where Vikas died in the encounter.
“Umesh had told the police during interrogation that the contract for killing was given for ₹10 lakh and ₹1 lakh had been paid. The police is also said to have recovered a weapon from the river bank,” said the officer.
Gopal Khemka was a businessman and a Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader who was shot dead by an unidentified assailant outside his home in Patna last week.
His killing came six years after his son Gunjan Khemka's murder in a similar fashion. Gunjan was shot dead by a bike-borne man on December 20, 2018.
