Banda: The Uttar Pradesh police's Special Investigation Team (SIT) detained three accomplices of Lovelesh Tiwari, one of the three prime suspects who allegedly opened fire at former MP Atiq Ahmed and his brother Ashraf Ahmed while the slain were addressing the media live on camera.
The trio, according to police sources, trained the trio on how to work like video journalists as a unit. The trio arrested on Wednesday also helped Lovelesh and his comrade-in-arms to purchase a video camera and the other requisite technical devices to pretend like a media unit. The trio was caught at Banda railway station. The SIT teams have been to Hamirpur and Kasganj to collect further evidence and information required for the prosecution.
Past arrest- Earlier, three people involved in the assassination were arrested. They were identified as Arun Maurya, Sunny Singh and Lovelesh Tiwari. All three assailants tailed Atiq and his brother throughout the day as journalists. They turned themselves in after the shootout. A CJM court in Uttar Pradesh's Prayagraj on Wednesday remanded gangster Atiq Ahmed's killers to a four-day police custody.
Police Custody- The custody was granted on a petition filed by the SIT seeking remand for questioning for all three accused. They were earlier sent to 14-day judicial custody by the district court on April 16. During the police remand, the police are questioning the accused about the weapon they used to pull off the assassination and how they were able to get the weapons from.
Atiq's wife Shaista Parveen on the run- On Wednesday, UP Police raided multiple locations in their bid to locate Shaista Parveen, wife of slain Atiq Ahmed, in Kaushambi. "Raids were conducted in search of Shaista Parveen, wife of gangster Atiq Ahmed. A search operation was conducted after receiving information about some criminals hiding. The operation lasted for about 2 hours. A drone camera was also used in the operation. However, the operation did not prove successful today," Kaushambi SAP Samar Bahadur said.
What happened so far? Atiq Ahmed's son Asad was earlier killed in an encounter in Jhansi. Days later, the mafia-turned-politician and his brother were killed on April 15 while being taken for a medical examination in Prayagraj in full media glare. Atiq was accused in the murder of BSP MLA Raju Pal in 2005. He was also arrested by the UP Police in connection with the murder of Umesh Pal, a key witness in the BSP leader's murder, in February this year.
