NEW DELHI: An alleged gangster from Bihar who apparently wanted to take control of the tender mafia in Patna and the surrounding areas was killed in an encounter with the Special Cell of the Delhi police in East Delhi in the early hours of Thursday. Earlier an accomplice who had allegedly provided shelter to him in the Capital had been arrested.

A team led by Assistant Commissioner of Police Sanjeev Yadav had received a tip-off about the alleged gangster, Guddu Sharma, hiding in the Capital. The team arrested his associate, Satish Sharma, at Pandav Nagar in East Delhi on Wednesday around 6-30 p.m. and recovered a 7.65 bore country-made revolver and live cartridges from him.

Satish allegedly told the police that Guddu had gone out for some work and would return late in the night. Around 1-30 a.m., Guddu was spotted on a motorcycle in Pandav Nagar. The police tried to flag him down but he made an attempt to flee and also opened fire at the police. He was killed in retaliatory fire. A .38-bore revolver was recovered from his person.

The police said Guddu who had killed a telecom engineer working for Reliance, Sanjeev, and a contractor, Ravi Ranjan, in Patna last month had called up a TV news channel to "declare" that he would not forgive anybody coming in the way of his "business". Before killing Ravi, Guddu had also killed two labourers working for him.

Guddu had come to the Capital on October 1. He then left for Vaishno Devi on October 4 and returned four days later. During this period, he apparently tied to establish contact with certain gangs operating from Western Uttar Pradesh. The police were yet to ascertain the identity of the gangs whom Guddu contacted.

What baffles the police is that a Capital-based private firm had given the contract to Guddu to kill the Reliance engineer and contractor.

The Bihar police have informed the Delhi police that Guddu had received Rs. 5 lakhs from the firm in question for killing Ravi and that he had demanded Rs. 50 lakhs from them.

Guddu had entered the world of crime in 2002. In the first two years, he was involved in two cases of murder. He then went on to commit several murders, most related to extortion. Guddu would first try to scare his targets -- businessmen, engineers and contractors working for the Central Public Works Department and those in the field of telecommunication -- by triggering off explosions at their residences or offices. If they refused to pay up, he would kill them. He had allegedly threatened and extorted money from more than 400 businessmen in Bihar, the police said.

Further investigations in the case are on.

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