File photo of BJP leader Vijay Pandit
Four people have been detained by the police in connection with the murder of BJP leader Vijay Pandit. They are being questioned right now.
Mr Pandit (37) was shot dead allegedly by four unidentified persons in Dadri area on Saturday night, after which a mob set ablaze 16 vehicles near a police station in protest.
The assailants came on two motorcycles and held the pistol at Mr Pandit's temple and mouth and shot him dead when he was returning home from his brother's shop at Bramhpuri at around 8.30 pm, police sources said.
Thereafter, they fired several rounds and one bullet hit the victim's chest too.
Mr Pandit, a former district BJP vice president, fell down bleeding. The assailants then fired in the air to scare away the people in the area and fled abandoning one motorcycle. The villagers and BJP workers, after hearing about the incident, reached the site and a mob set ablaze around sixteen vehicles near Dadri Kotwali on G T Road.
They also pelted stones at the buses and other passing vehicles and police fired some shots in the air to control the mob which attacked the police team, the sources said.
District Magistrate A V Rajamouli deployed additional forces from neighbouring districts and PAC and Rapid Action too were pressed into service. An injured Vijay Pandit was taken to Dadri's Mohan Swarup Hospital from where he was shifted to Ghaziabad Yashoda Hospital where doctors declared him dead.
One bullet hit Mr Pandit in the mouth, another in the chest and one behind the ear, police sources said. Two policemen were injured in skirmishes with the mob, police sources said.
According to the police, the murder could have been the result of a personal rivalry and they are suspecting that a local gang is behind it. Prohibitory orders have been put in place in the area where the shootout took place.