Gangster killed, associates nabbed in encounter with Bihar police

Criminal Manish Kumar Singh alias Hero had escaped from judicial custody on August 26 this year. He formed a gang and started extortion in Ara Town and surrounding areas. Two months ago, he targeted two locations in Ara the same day and killed one Vipul Mishra.

In a Bollywood-type encounter with the Bihar police in Bhojpur district in the midst of Chhath festivities, a dreaded criminal was killed, while two others were arrested with two sophisticated pistols on Tuesday. Their fourth colleague, Monu Kumar alias Mannu Singh, managed to escape. He was, however, arrested on Wednesday.

A unit of Bihar Police (HT File Photo)

The slain criminal has been identified as Manish Kumar Singh alias Hero, 24, who was Ara’s terror. The other two arrested criminals —Abhishek Kumar Pandey alias Bittoo Singh and Kundan Kumar alias Raja— were accused in Varanasi’s JVH Mall shoot-out case in which two persons were killed and two others were injured on October 31 last. Uttar Pradesh police had announced a reward of ₹25,000 on the head of Kundan and others involved in the shootout.

Police said that Hero had escaped from judicial custody on August 26 this year. He formed a gang and started extortion in Ara Town and surrounding areas. Two months ago, he targeted two locations in Ara the same day. In one of the firing incidents at a Mahindra tractor Showroom, one Vipul Mishra was killed and Saroj Yadav had sustained injuries.

In order to create a sense of terror, the criminals left behind a card carrying letter ‘H’ and a lion symbol that referred to the Hero Gang. This was last month had attacked staffs of a brick-kiln chimney injuring the accountant.

IG (operations) Kundan Krishnan said that on Tuesday noon, police got information about four criminals on two luxury cars moving in Piro Bazar locality. On getting information, joint team of Piro police and Special Weapons and Tactics Units (SWAT) of STF led by Bhojpur SP Aditya Kumar reached the spot at around 2pm and surrounded the criminals.

“Police trapped Abhishek and Kundan, but Hero and another member managed to escape. Hero entered Jitora Bazar and started firing on the police team. For safety, he ran into the houses where Chhath-Puja celebrations was on. The police had to tread cautiously,” he added.

Sensing trouble and stampede like situation due to use of force, SWAT team in plain dress camped in the area and alerted locals about Hero’s hiding. “Taking advantage of crowd, Hero managed to enter Baraon village and took shelter in a nearby water body. Subsequently a youth informed the SP that one suspect wearing earrings was hiding in the midst of ‘jalkumbhi (Pistia stratiotes).

As police team reached near the water body around 9 pm, Hero fired five bullets at them. In the exchange of fire, Hero was killed. “Hero had become a challenge for the police as he been demanding extortion indiscriminately and using terror,” said Krishnan, adding that he used video and whatsapp call for demanding extortion from New Delhi and UP, where he fled after carrying out the crime.

Bhojpur SP said that Hero had 12 cases on his name, while Kundan was wanted in three cases.

Varanasi police had recently visited Bhojpur to arrest Kundan but failed. Earlier UP police had arrested Rohit Singh, a native of Bhabhua and currently living in Nirala Nagar locality of Varanasi. Police are also looking for one Rishabh Singh alias Rishu of Bhojpur in the mall shootout case. Police said that Kundan, Rishabh, Rohit along with one Alok had gone to the mall to threaten a salesman, Prashant, who had misbehaved with one of their female friend, working in the showroom.

As Alok began abusing Prashant and others in the mall, the mall staff overpowered and nabbed him. Seeing themselves trapped, the four started firing in which two salesmen, Gopi and Sunil, were killed while two others were injured.