- A man accused of a 1997 Delhi murder was arrested after 29 years on the run
- Mohammad Fahim killed co-worker Sharif Hasan Khan over a monetary dispute
- Fahim assaulted Khan with an iron rod and strangled him before fleeing Delhi
A man accused of murdering a co-worker in west Delhi in 1997 and remaining on the run for nearly 29 years has been arrested by the crime branch of the Delhi Police, an official said on Monday.
The accused, identified as Mohammad Fahim alias Ali Bhai, was wanted in connection with the murder of 58-year-old Sharif Hasan Khan and was declared a proclaimed offender by a court later in 1997 after evading arrest despite repeated efforts by police.
"Fahim was arrested from Thakurganj in Lucknow on July 3 following months of fresh investigation, intelligence gathering and technical surveillance that helped crack one of Delhi Police's oldest pending murder cases," a senior police officer said.
The case dates back to March 14, 1997, when the body of an unidentified man was recovered from a room at TC Camp in Raghubir Nagar. During the investigation, the deceased was identified as Sharif Hasan Khan, a resident of Faizabad district, now Ayodhya, in Uttar Pradesh, who worked at a clothing shop in Rajouri Garden.
"Fahim had come to Delhi in search of work and had become acquainted with Khan. On March 13, 1997, the two allegedly got into a dispute after Fahim stole money from the victim. During the altercation, he assaulted Khan repeatedly with an iron rod and later strangled him with a rope to ensure his death before hiding the body inside a wooden bed box and fleeing the city," the officer said.
The crime branch said the case was recently assigned to its central range for reinvestigation. Officers re-examined the nearly three-decade-old case despite the absence of recent photographs, reliable identification records and modern digital evidence, as the crime predated contemporary investigative databases.
Police said the team developed local intelligence in the accused's native village, which indicated that he was alive and occasionally visited the area. Continuous surveillance later traced his movements to Lucknow, where a police team conducted a planned operation and apprehended him.
During interrogation, Fahim confessed to killing Khan over the monetary dispute. He told the team that after the murder he fled to Nagpur and spent the next 29 years moving between Maharashtra and Uttar Pradesh, including Mumbai, Lucknow and Nagpur, while concealing his identity under a false name as Ali Bhai.
Police said the accused worked as a Plaster of Paris (POP) artisan during his years in hiding and frequently changed locations to avoid arrest.
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