Bengaluru: A 48-year-old financier was brutally hacked to death by three assailants in broad daylight near his house on the busy streets of Cottonpet on Saturday morning. While one threw chilli powder on the victim’s face, the other two assaulted him with machetes, said the police.
The incident happened around 10.50 am when the victim, identified as Babu Singh, was returning home on his two-wheeler after paying electricity bill. The three assailants, who had come in an auto-rickshaw, were lying in wait near his house. The attack happened on the busy OTC Road, near Goods Shed Road in Cottonpet.
The victim was attacked with machetes and he died instantly on the spot. After being informed, the police reached the spot and shifted the body to Victoria Hospital for post-mortem. Additional Commissioner of police, Alok Kumar, Joint Commissioner of police, Ravi along with two Deputy Commissioner of Police, Abhishek Goyal and Labhu Ram visited the spot to take stock of the incident.
There were a couple of lodges on OTC Road that had installed CCTV cameras outside, which was close the crime spot and had caught the crime in action. “We have retrieved CCTV footages from all the sources leading to the crime spot and are still working on it. We have got some vital clues and the immediate priority is to arrest the culprits,” S. Ravi, Joint Commissioner (West) told Deccan Chronicle.
Babu Singh’s brothers, who rushed to the Cottonpet police station for lodging a complaint, claimed that their brother was murdered by one rowdy-sheeter named Manjunath alias Paanipuri Manja over a financial row. One of his brothers Manjunath Singh told Deccan Chronicle that Babu Singh had lodged a police complaint against Panipuri Manja, who had not returned the money he had borrowed.
“A fortnight ago, a lower court had convicted the rowdy-sheeter and ruled that he has to return the money to Babu Singh in a stipulated time, or else he will be jailed,” said Manjunath Singh. “It was definitely a planned murder of vengeance. The rowdy-sheeter had been openly warning, threatening and intimidating Babu Singh for quite some time, after the latter had lodged a police complaint against him for recovering money,” the victim’s brother said.
“Panipuri Manja had been writing cheques to the victim that used to get bounced,” the victim’s another brother added. Babu Singh is one among the five brothers who have been a resident of Cottonpet for over 12 years. His wife works as a beautician and the couple had two children, a son aged 6 and a daughter aged 9.
