The Hindu : New Delhi News : Businessman shot dead on Delhi road

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Tuesday, Apr 08, 2008
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New Delhi

New Delhi

Businessman shot dead on Delhi road

Staff Reporter

Killers escape on motorcycle in broad daylight; police suspect property dispute

BEREAVED: The distraught wife and son of the murdered businessman at their residence on Monday afternoon.

NEW DELHI: A wholesale dealer in electrical goods was shot dead by three unidentified assailants on a busy road in South Delhi on Monday in broad daylight. The assailants, suspected to be contract killers, sped away on a motorcycle even as passers-by watched the bloody drama in horror.

Forty-six-year-old Arun Gupta was on his way to his shop, Krishna Electricals, at Bhagirath Place in Chandni Chowk around 10-30 in the morning when a young man intercepted his car near a roundabout and tapped on the window.

Point blank

When an unsuspecting Mr. Gupta rolled down the glass, the man fired at him and drove away with his two accomplices.

One of Mr. Gupta’s acquaintances, who owns a shop in the area where the shooting took place, sent his domestic help to the victim’s residence in E Block of Kalkaji to inform the family about the murder. Mr. Gupta’s teenaged son Harshal and wife Sadhna rushed to the spot and took the bleeding victim to Holy Family Hospital where he was declared brought dead.

Recalling the tragic episode, Harshal said no passers-by came forward to help him move his father to the rear seat of the car.

“My mother was inconsolable and I had to drag my father to the back seat all alone. We went to a few hospitals, but they all refused to attend to my father. He was finally taken to Holy Family, but by then it was too late,” said young Harshal.

The businessman’s elder son, Rishab, is pursuing an engineering course in Roorkee.

Based on preliminary investigations so far, the police said the victim was involved in a longstanding property dispute with his in-laws. “We are probing all angles, but prima facie it appears to be a fall-out of a property dispute. Mr. Gupta and his in-laws are involved in a legal tangle over distribution of property after his father-in-law M. L. Mittal’s death and a case is pending before the High Court. Mr. Gupta’s mother-in-law had recently given a written complaint to the police expressing fear for her life from her sons,” said a senior police officer.

Speaking on condition of anonymity, a close relative of the Guptas said: “Arun Gupta’s father-in-law had left behind a huge property worth several crores. Arun used to get regular threat calls and the family received one such call on Sunday night as well.”

Denying knowledge of any property dispute, Mr. Gupta’s elder sister Anita Sachdev, a Reader at Delhi University’s Laxmi Bai College, said: “Ours is a close-knit family and there is absolutely no dispute between us. Arun was a very well-behaved and soft-spoken person. His death has come as a shock to us. I have no knowledge about his purported dispute with his brothers-in-law.”

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