Five Vikas aides killed, two injured since Bikru ambush

KANPUR: Five of slain gangster

Vikas Dubey

aides have been killed in separate encounters since July 2 & 3, the day on which eight policemen were killed in an ambush.

Prem Kumar Pandey and Atul Kumar were killed on the same day a few hours after the ambush in an

alleged exchange

of fire. A pistol and rifle looted from the police team that had gone to raid Dubey’s house in Bikru were recovered from them, said police.

Pandey, was a distant maternal uncle of Dubey. His son Shashikant, who works in a private factory, is also an accused with a bounty of 50,000. He is on the run.

Amar Dubey, an aide of Vikas Dubey, who was often seen carrying a rifle with the

history-sheeter

, was shot dead in a village in Hamirpur’s Maudaha on Wednesday. According to police, Amar was spotted in a village after a tip-off. On being challenged, he started firing at police.

A sub-inspector was shot in his bullet-proof vest. The STF sleuths then asked him to surrender but he hurled expletives and started firing again. Then, the police retaliated in a bid to arrest him and a constable was injured after allegedly being shot by Amar. Thereafter, he was shot. He died at a community health centre in Maudaha. An illegal semi-automatic .32 bore pistol was recovered from him.

Prabhat Mishra

alias Kartikeya, another aide of Vikas Dubey, was arrested in Faridabad on Wednesday. On Thursday, he was being brought to Kanpur under transit remand when one of the tyres of a police vehicle was punctured near Panki, said police. Prabhat, taking advantage of the situation, snatched a pistol from a sub-inspector and tried to flee. Later, he was killed when the police team retaliated in self defence.

Ranveer alias Bauwa Pandey was shot dead in

Etawah

the same day. At around 3.30 a.m. on Thursday, some persons in an SUV were spotted escaping after looting a car on a highway near Bakewar, Etawah. They were intercepted at Kachaura road at 4:30 a.m. and, during the chase, the looted car collided with a tree after which the criminals started firing on the police.

When Bauwa Pandey was intercepted, he fired at the police team and in cover fire he got seriously injured and was declared dead in hospital, added police. A pistol and a DBBL gun were recovered from him. His three accomplices managed to flee in the SUV, said police.

Shyamu Bajpai was also shot by police in his leg in a separate incident but he survived. Bajpai and the two others were arrested on July 7 during a vehicle check, said police.

Dayashankar Agnihotri, Vikas Dubey’s cook, was also arrested by police after an alleged exchange of fire in which he was shot in his leg. After his arrest, Agnihotri told the media that on the night of the ambush, Dubey had received a tip-off about the police raid from a policeman in Chaubeypur station and that he had then called around 20-30 shooters to his house.