Ahmedabad

The Gujarat ATS, which claimed to have cracked the double murder of BJP leaders in Bharuch earlier this month, today handed over to police the seven accused whom they had arrested from Uttarakhand and Rajasthan.

The ATS today handed over to Bharuch police the three persons it arrested from Uttarakhand and also four other accused arrested from Mount Abu in Rajasthan yesterday in connection with the case, an ATS official said.

They were arrested after a meticulously carried out operation by the ATS, wherein they traced and picked up the accused from places like Uttarakhand and Mount Abu besides Gujarat.

“The trio were arrested, by a team of ATS officials, from Piran Kaliyar dargah near Haridwar yesterday where they have been hiding for many days. The team arrived here this evening with the accused and they were handed over to Bharuch police for further action,” Inspector General of ATS, J K Bhatt stated in a release.

The trio were identified as Haider Ali Shaikh (29), Mohsin Khan Pathan (25) and Nisar Ahmed Shaikh (30), all residents of Suart, while four others as Joyeb alias Juhaib Ansari, the sharpshooter who allegedly opened fire on the two leaders, Inayat Vora, Saiyad Imran Kadri and Yunus Shaikh.

According to ATS, Haider, Mohsin and Nisar fled to Ajmer soon after the BJP leaders were murdered on November 2 and then proceeded to Kaliyar dargah near Haridwar.

“Our investigation revealed that Haider was riding the bike while Joyeb, who opened fire, was riding pillion. Mohsin and Nisar had conducted recce of the BJP leaders and passed on the information to the duo to carry out the killings,” said Bhatt.

The agency yesterday announced that it had unravelled the conspiracy behind murders of Shirish Bangali, former BJP president of Bharuch district and senior RSS member, and Pragnesh Mistry, general secretary of the Bharatiya Janta Yuva Morcha of Bharuch district, by arresting seven persons.

The agency had said that the contract for their killing was allegedly given by absconding 1993 Mumbai serial blasts accused Javed Chikna from South Africa, apparently to avenge subsequent riots in Mumbai and Gujarat.

According to ATS, the assignment to carry out the contractual killing was given by Chikna to Saiyad Kadri who subsequently roped in six others to carry out the murders. PTI