Businessman and BJP activist Ashok Kumar Singh, alias Raghav who was shot at and seriously injured at Sonari late Saturday evening, was attacked for being a police informer. The victim is still struggling for life.
Officer-in-charge, Sonari police station Anuj Kumar said that Ashok Singh has a tainted background. “last month he was grilled by CBI in a Rose Valley chit-fund case in Kolkata in which his name had figured. There were more than one criminal cases pending against him at the Jamshedpur civil court,” said the officer-in-charge.
Sources maintained that Singh, who is also a BJP activist, was targeted by the criminals for being a police informer.
Singh (45) is admitted at the Tata Main Hospital’s high dependency unit (HDU). He has sustained three gun-shot injuries — one bullet had hit his left arm, and two bullets into the ribs.
The surgeons, who attended to the victim. has succeeded to take out one of the pellets trapped in the ribs, where as another pellet is still inside.
Superintendent of police (City) Prashant Anand said that they are yet to take a statement from the victim as he is not in a condition to speak. They were investigating the incident.
“We will take the statement from the injured first and then can further start investigating. After we record the statement, we will be able to speak the exact reason behind the gun-shot attack,” said Anand. He pointed out that they are carrying out the probe and they would know about the attackers soon.
But sources in the police revealed that one Ravi Singh and three of his associates are suspected to be involved in the gun-shot attack.
“As per our information, October last, Ravi Singh, who is a resident of Balichela area in Sonari was arrested along with three of his associates for possessing pistols. Ravi suspected that Ashok Singh who used to help police by passing information had a role behind their arrest. This is why Ravi and his associates targeted him,” said a police officer on condition of anonymity.
Singh, who is a resident of Sardar Akhara locality in Sonari, was shot and injured while he was returning from Ram Mandir by riding his scooter near the temple at about 7 pm on Saturday. The assailant had pumped four bullets, causing three of them to hit the victim.
The Sonari police had past midnight raided the houses of Ravi Singh and also at the houses of his three associates, but they all were found missing from the house. Police are continuing raids at different places in Sonari and elsewhere in the city for detecting Ravi Singh (32) who is suspected to have launched the armed attack.