Kanpur: Another alleged criminal was arrested on Sunday in connection with last month's encounter in Kanpur in which eight police personnel were killed, the Uttar Pradesh police said.
Ram Singh Yadav, a resident of Chaubeypur, was carrying a cash reward of Rs 50,000, Special Task Force (STF) Inspector General Amitabh Yash said.
Yadav is being interrogated by a team of senior officers to gain information about those who were behind the ambush, Yash said.
Efforts are also being made to extract information about where the weapons that were used in the ambush were disposed off, the officer said.
Yadav is one of the eight accused who were either arrested or surrendered till now. Hunt is on for the other seven accused.
The SIT set up to probe Bikru massacre had been asked to probe the role of the police, his relations with police personnel and the factors which led Vikas's emergence as a gangster.
Eight police personnel, including a DSP, were killed in the ambush at a village near Kanpur by the henchmen of gangster Vikas Dubey on the intervening night of July 2 and 3.
As many as six prime accused, including Vikas Dubey, and five of his aides -- Prabhat Mishra, Amar Dubey, Bauan Dubey, Prem Kumar Pandey and Atul Dubey -- were gunned down in separate encounters since July 3. Dubey was arrested by the Madhya Pradesh Police in Ujjain on July 9. He was on the run and had come to the city to offer prayers at the Mahakal temple. Dubey was killed in an encounter by the Uttar Pradesh Police on July 10 after he "attempted to flee".
The gangster was the main accused in the encounter that took place in Bikru village in Chaubeypur area of Kanpur, in which a group of assailants opened fire on a police team, which had gone to arrest him.
Dubey had over 60 cases registered against him. He had hit the headlines when he killed a state minister Santosh Shukla inside the Shivli police station in 2001. Dubey was acquitted in the case because none of the policemen testified against him.
Several aides of Dubey have been arrested either by the STF or the Kanpur Police, while Gopal Saini surrendered himself before a special court in Kanpur Dehat a few days back.
Those who are still at large are Chotu Shukla, Shiv Tewari, Vishnu Pal Yadav, Ramu Bajpai, Hiru Dubey, Buwwan Shukla and Bal Govind.
With inputs from agencies
Also read: SIT report on slain gangster Dubey likely to be delayed
