Oil mafia could be behind Dey's murder: Police

Police probing the murder of senior investigative journalist Jyotirmoy Dey on Sunday said the killing could be a handiwork of people associated with the oil mafia and the assailants may have been hired from outside Mumbai.

Police probing the murder of senior investigative journalist Jyotirmoy Dey on Sunday said the killing could be a handiwork of people associated with the oil mafia and the assailants may have been hired from outside Mumbai.

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"We are probing the incident from all angles. But our line of investigation is going towards checking the possible involvement of people associated with the oil mafia. The journalist had extensively written a number of news reports on the oil mafia, which may have triggered them to eliminate him," a senior police officer said on condition of anonymity,

Dey had extensively covered crime and underworld over two decades.

"We have a reason to believe that the killers must have been hired from outside Mumbai or maybe from outside Maharashtra," the officer said, adding four teams have been formed by the Crime Branch to probe the matter on a priority basis.

The way the killing was executed, it was very clear that the assailants had made a perfect plan to eliminate the journalist, the officer said.

Meanwhile, the post-mortem report, prepared by government-run JJ Hospital says that five bullets were fired at the journalist. While four bullets pierced through his body, one bullet had stuck in his right chest.

"Three bullets had hit on his left arm and one on his left chest. One bullet got stuck in his right chest," said the officer.

Dey's last rites were performed at suburban Ghatkopar here.Scribes from various print and electronic media were present.

An emergency meeting has been called by Maharashtra Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan to discuss the murder of Dey, who was shot dead by unidentified assailants in suburban Powai on Saturday, sending shock waves in the media fraternity.

State Home Minister RR Patil and Mumbai Police Commissioner Arup Patnaik would be attending the meeting.