Chennai: The Kancheepuram Police arrested on Tuesday as many as eight hirelings who were party to the Sunday murder of the DMK ward member of village panchayat in Padappai.
The arrested were identified as K. Arun aka Arunkumar (31), Dinesh (26), M. Suresh (24), V. Suresh (24), V. Kanniyappan aka Vishwanathan (24), T. Mani aka Manikandan (25), V. Ajithkumar (22) and S. Prakash (24), all from Karisangal.
The cops traced the eight persons with the help of an abandoned bike spotted in a causarina grove near Karisangal near Manimangalam.
The cops got to the gang while tracing the owner of the abandoned vehicle since it was identified as one among the bikes the gang used to flee from the CSI church in David Nagar after committing the murder.
Though the cops had ascertained the motive behind the murder to be business rivalry, the arrested remained tight lipped throughout the interrogation. The deceased, G. Dhanasekharan of Periyar Nagar was the DMK youth wing secretary in Padappai and also of ward number 6 of the civic body.
Dhanasekharan, a member of St. Devasabha, a Pentecostal church, had stepped out of the church to attend a phone call around 11.30 am when a gang, which was lying in wait, surrounded him. He ran into a neighbouring CSI church where the Sunday worship service was underway.
He did so to keep the gang focused on him so as to spare his wife Daisy and two sons who were participating in the worship at his church. He was hacked to death in full view of the congregation of the neighbouring Church. The deceased was into sand and real estate businesses.
