Loopholes in plot led to arrest of Gauri's killers

Bengaluru: The “organized crime syndicate,” which is behind the murder of former journalist-activist Gauri Lankesh was caught in the trap of “not-so perfectly planned and orchestrated murder”, said sources, who are privy to the investigation. “The same syndicate is reportedly behind the murders of the three noted rationalists - Prof Narendra Dabholkar in Pune, Communist leader Govind Pansare in Kolhapur and Prof M.M. Kalburgi in Dharwad. Though there has been no major breakthrough in these, the investigation done so far by the CBI, Maharashtra SIT and Karnataka CID backed by the ballistic reports of the weapons used in the three cases, witness accounts and other evidences was of immense help to the SIT in cracking the Gauri murder case,” the source added.

“After the assassination of Prof Kalburgi the killers had felt that they had perfected the craft of target murder and executed their fourth target – Gauri, who was the ‘enemy within’ as per the ‘Kshatra Dharma Sadhana,’ published by the ‘Sanatan Sanstha.’ They had compartmentalized the tasks among the 18 accused and had done everything possible to erase any trace of evidence but three things blew the lid off their blood craft – the CCTV image of the assailant, which later turned to be that of accused number two - Parshuram Waghmore, who was arrested in June from Sindagi taluk in Vijaypura district, the investigation done by the three premier agencies the CBI, Maharashtra SIT and Karnataka CID in the earlier three murder cases and the planning of their fifth target – writer K.S. Bhagwan. “Heightened surveillance after Gauri’s assassination led to the first arrest of gunrunner and Hindu Yuva Sena member K.T. Naveen Kumar in March, who was caught boasting about his alleged involvement in the Gauri murder and his next ambitious assignment; of getting Bhagwan,” he added.

Director General of Police, CID, Praveen Sood said the credit behind cracking the Gauri murder case goes to the “outstanding” team of officers in the SIT, which is headed by IGP B.K. Singh. “IPS officers like Singh, M.N. Anuchet and Harish Pandey, assisted by DySP Rangappa and Inspectors Puneeth and Sridhar Pujar, and the rest were able to track every lead and analyse huge amounts of technical data,” Sood said.