Manjeet Mahal, one of Capital’s most wanted gangsters, arrested
NEWDELHI: Manjeet Mahal, one of Delhi’s most wanted criminals allegedly involved in a series of heinous crimes, including the killing of a former MLA who was the brother of a powerful gangster, was arrested on Thursday.
Mahal ranks second in Delhi Police’s list of top 10 criminals after Ravinder Alias Bholu, who is involved in more than 50 cases of murder, land-grabbing and extortion.
Delhi Police special cell arrested him in Dwarka. A pistol and 52 cartridges were seized.
Mahal was missing for over two years and carried a reward of Rs 50,000, a senior police officer said. Delhi Police said Mahal was involved in planning the murder of former Indian National Lok Dal MLA from Najafgarh, Bharat Singh, brother of Delhi gangster Krishan Pehalwan.
Six to seven men armed with automatic firearms gunned down Singh at a farmhouse in Najafgarh, where he was attending a social gathering on March 29, 2015. The murder was mainly planned by Pehalwan’s enemy from his village Udaiveer Kala and his nephew Hemant with Mahal’s support. Hemant is missing.
Police sources said Mahal was planning to murder Pehalwan. He was arranging for weapons and shooters to execute a rerun of the March 2015 shootout on Pehalwan.
With his arrest, the city police foiled a potential attack on Pehalwan and the continuation of bloodbaths between the two gangs which caused over 50 people from either gang to die in the past two decades.
Pehelwan is also accused of a string heinous crimes such as murder, extortion, land grabbing. He is out on bail in a criminal conspiracy case.
Deputy commissioner of police (special cell) Pramod Singh Kushwah said Mahal was arrested at 1 pm on Thursday.
Three special cell teams, besides others units of Delhi Police, hunted for Mahal in Hyderabad, Mumbai, Dehradun, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh for the past five months.
“We got inputs that Mahal was trying to procure sophisticated weapons to kill his rivals,” said Kushwah. Mahal is the kingpin of Delhi’s most dreaded AnoopBalraj gang .