BENGALURU: The Special Investigation Team (SIT), probing the murder of senior journalist and activist Gauri Lankesh, has arrested the seventh accused in connection with the murder. The accused Mohan Naik (50) was picked up from Dakshina Kannada district, based on the information provided by Parashuram Waghmore, the suspect shooter who pumped three bullets into Gauri on September 5, 2017 outside her residence in RR Nagar.
Though SIT officials kept Naik's specific role in the murder confidential, sources said that he played a prominent role in the murder of Gauri and may have arranged and handed over the murder weapon to Waghmore. Naik was arrested on Wednesday and produced in the third Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate (ACMM) Court which remanded him to six-day police custody. The SIT is interrogating Naik to extract more information about the involvement of the other accused and the mastermind on whose instructions the murder was carried out.
The SIT has previously arrested Hindutva outfit leader K.T. Naveen Kumar alias Hotte Manja, Amol Kale, Manohar Yavade, Sujeeth Kumar alias Praveen and Amit Degvekar, all having links with right-wing organisations. According to a source, the SIT suspects the involvement of many more in the murder of Gauri and believe that the arrest of Naik could help in identifying them.
