NEW DELHI: In what appears to be the fall-out of a gang war, two brothers were gunned down inside their gymnasium at Najafgarh in South-West Delhi on Tuesday. Their elder brother was murdered in Gurgaon, while another acquaintance and his wife were killed in Bahadurgarh this August.

The double murder took place around 1 p.m. when two young men entered the gymnasium owned by Ajay and Arun and opened indiscriminate fire at them before fleeing in their Santro car. The police said the culprits fired over a dozen rounds.

The victims were rushed to different hospitals where they were declared dead on arrival. The police said both had a criminal past. "They were involved in cases of auto-theft," said a senior police officer.

The police suspect the killings to be the handiwork of an alleged auto-lifter, Hemant Sonu. His brother Deepak, who was a notorious auto-lifter, was killed in an encounter with the armed forces in Assam when he was travelling with his girlfriend in a stolen Scorpio about a year ago. Suspecting that Ajay, Arun and their elder brother, Ashok, had tipped off the police about Deepak's whereabouts through a resident of Bahadurgarh, Hemant began eliminating them one by one.

First he got the Bahadurgarh contact and his wife murdered on August 26, and two days later Ajay's elder brother, Ashok, who ran a studio in Gurgaon, was gunned down. On Tuesday, Ajay and Arun were eliminated.

Said to be a desperate criminal, Hemant -- whose father was in the Army -- has been stealing vehicles from different parts of the Capital. The Najafgarh police have registered a case of murder and launched a hunt for Hemant and his accomplices.

While the shoot-out created terror in the area, it is alleged that several young men from Najafgarh, who usually pose as body builders, are entering the world of crime to make quick money. "Several small gyms have come up in the area, some of which need to be kept under constant surveillance," said the police officer.

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