Excise inspector shot at in Ghaziabad

GHAZIABAD: An inspector with the Uttar Pradesh excise department was shot in the leg on Sunday night. The excise department and police came up with two different versions as to how and where inspector Varun Kumar was shot at.
While the excise department said Kumar was shot at by bootleggers, police said he was shot in celebratory firing at a wedding in Morta, where the excise official was a guest.
Giving his version, district excise officer D N Singh said Kumar came under fire when he tried to intercept a truck carrying illicit liquor on Sunday night. "Inspector Varun Kumar, along with three excise constables and a driver, was waiting to stop a liquor-loaded truck near ALT Centre. He signalled the truck driver to stop, but he drove on. Instead, a man from an accompanying Wagon R car shot at him in the leg," Singh said.
The district excise officer said a written complaint had been handed over to the Sihani Gate police. "I do not know whether or not a case has been registered," he said.
On the other hand, the Sihani Gate police, based on their version of how the shooting took place, arrested one Sandip Tyagi, a building contractor of Morta, for shooting the excise inspector in his leg in a drunken state. According to police, Tyagi was firing in the air at a wedding ceremony in Morta, where the official was a guest. The police said they seized two country-made pistols, a licenced pistol and some cartridges from Tyagi.
Amid the contradiction between the excise department and police, district magistrate Vimal Sharma directed the chief development officer (CDO), Krishna Karunesh, to meet the victim and other excise officials to "find out the facts". Sharma said, "I have handed over the investigation to the CDO".
The police station chief said the excise officer was cooking up the story to divert attention from his host, Tyagi. Excise inspector Ajay Yadav, however, disagreed, saying "It is too much to expect a man shot in the leg to cook up a story. Let's wait for the probe".