THE KILLING of former DAV PG College students’ union president and railway contractor Arun Singh Gudda had raised question over inefficiency of Lucknow police over keeping vigilance on activities of jailed gangsters. Gudda, despite being a contractor and former student leader, had never indulged in criminal activities but he lost his life keeping faith in the police.
SSP Ashutosh Pandey’s insistence to focus the entire investigation on Lallu Yadav hampered the process while the real culprits were spending good time. Pandey wanted the cops not to take pain in tracing the assailants and work out the case soon.
THE INCIDENT
GUDDA, ALONG with an employee of his construction firm, on a motorcycle and his brother and another person on another motorcycle left his Rajajipuram house in the morning. They all had to reach the Divisional Railway Manager, Northern Railway office, regarding a contract.
As Gudda crossed the Jalalpur railway crossing and reached the Jagjivan Ram RPSF Training Centre, Alambagh, two youths riding a motorcycle came close to them. Gudda, who was sitting on the pillion, could not gauge the intention of the youths moving closer to his motorcycle. One of the youths on the motorcycle suddenly whipped out a pistol and opened fire aiming at Gudda.
The shooter sprayed Gudda with bullets following which he fell on the ground bleeding profusely. Before Gudda’s brother and other associates could have raised an alarm for help the assailants sped off.
{{/usCountry}}The shooter sprayed Gudda with bullets following which he fell on the ground bleeding profusely. Before Gudda’s brother and other associates could have raised an alarm for help the assailants sped off.
{{/usCountry}}Gudda was rushed to the KGMU where he died in the wee hours of October 19.
Gudda’s kin had then referred to a dispute with Lallu Yadav over possession of a plot in Talkatora leading to the killing.
HT INVESTIGATION
SHEER LACK of interest was shown by SSP Ashutosh Pandey and his team in working out the Gudda murder case. Though Pandey succeeded in slapping one more case on land mafioso Lallu Yadav, he encouraged jailed gangster Aditya Mishra in terrorising railway contractors.
As the SSP did not want to give time to Alambagh police in investigating the case properly, the latter did not collect concrete evidence in the case.
HT investigation revealed that it was Aditya Mishra who had hatched the plot to eliminate Gudda merely to send a message among other railway contractors. Mishra, lodged in Lucknow district jail, wanted to grab the annual contract of Alam Nagar zone worth several lakhs of rupees.
Since Gudda used to manage the particular contract for the last several years he was the only strong contender against Mishra. After the notice for the tender was issued Mishra asked Lallu Yadav to discuss the matter with Gudda. Mishra wanted Lallu to ask Mishra to withdraw the latter’s claim over the contract.
Though there was a dispute between Lallu and Gudda earlier they had got the matter resolved later and both were on good talking terms.
To appease his friend, Lallu Yadav talked to Gudda from behind the bars about two weeks before the murder. Lallu had tried to convince Gudda to hand over the tender form to Mishra’s aides for the contract. But Gudda categorically had turned down Lallu’s advice saying that he was the only contender for the contract for the last several years and it was related to his credit in the business.
Investigation revealed that as Lallu’s effort went in vain Mishra himself talked to Gudda threatening the latter to either withdraw his claim from the tender or face the music. Gudda had then responded to Mishra in the same manner accepting the latter’s challenge.
Mishra soon contacted his henchman Upendra Rai and a police inspector’s son Kukki for the job. Rai was asked to arrange the shooters from eastern UP. The shooters stayed at Kukki’s house for a day. And the very next day, Rai took shooters to the DRM office for identification of the target (Gudda). Early in the morning on October 18, the shooters bumped off Gudda. Investigation further revealed that Mishra had called up a few of the railway contractors enquiring if Gudda was dead, and about the police action. The gangster had also enquired about those named in the case.
On October 19 Mishra had organised a celebration inside the jail barrack after hearing about confirmation of Gudda’s death. The police did not initiate any effort to put cell phones of Aditya Mishra and Lallu Yadav on surveillance as the gangsters were engaged in discussing Gudda’s murder with their associates for more than a week.
(This series concludes)