The country has been shocked by the death of a politician in the bustling city of Mumbai.
On Saturday evening, Baba Ziauddin Siddique, 56, was shot near his vehicle as he was leaving his son’s office.
He succumbed to his injuries in Lilavati Hospital.
The attack, claimed by a member of the Lawrence Bishnoi gang, occurred due to Siddique’s close proximity to Bollywood actor
Salman Khan, who has been on their ‘hit list’ over the 1998 poaching case.
The Mumbai Police said that the two accused initially arrested in the case used social media applications like Instagram and Snapchat to communicate and viewed YouTube videos to learn how to shoot.
YouTube to learn how to shoot
The Mumbai Crime Branch claims that Dharamraj Kashyap and Gurmail Singh, the two gunmen who were arrested, learnt how to shoot by watching YouTube videos.
After that, they would rehearse shooting without a magazine in a residence in Kurla that was rented in the name of the third suspect, who is currently on the run.
Siddique’s banner photo was provided to them so they could rehearse target shooting without using ammunition.
Moreover, a 7.62 mm handgun was found in a black bag close to the crime scene on Tuesday.
Social media for communication
Four suspects have been taken into custody by the crime branch thus far, while three are still on the run.
The fourth culprit, 23-year-old Harishkumar Balakram Nisad, who was arrested earlier in the day, acted as a broker and supplied cash and weapons for the crime.
According to police, Gurmail and Dharamraj received Rs 2 lakh from Pravin Lonkar, another arrested culprit, and his brother Shubham Lonkar, another wanted accused. Harishkumar handed over the money.
According to the Mumbai Police, Harishkumar, a Pune resident for the last nine years, also provided the alleged gunmen with two cell phones.
The investigation also reveals that the accused communicated via social media, using Instagram to make calls and Snapchat to send messages.
Authorities claimed that Shubham was aware of messaging apps and had instructed everyone in the Siddique murder plot to communicate using Snapchat and Instagram in order to evade detection.
Murder planned in Pune
The investigation has shows that the plan to kill Siddique began three months ago and the accused visited his Bandra residence several times without weapons.
According to the police, 25 days prior to the crime, the accused also conducted a recce of the politician’s home.
They say an Apache motorbike that was allegedly used to perform a recce of the politician’s home in Maqba Heights and his office in Kher Nagar has been seized by the crime branch.
The entire murder plan was designed in Pune, according to the information.
An official stated that the accused had been in Mumbai for one and a half months before the crime.
So far, over 15 people, including eyewitnesses, have been questioned.
Accused on the run
Shivkumar Gautam, the third shooter, who allegedly had “experience of celebratory firing” in Uttar Pradesh, is still on the run along with Mohammed Zeeshan Akhtar, who was the alleged handler of the three shooters. The city crime branch has formed several teams to arrest them.
Shivkumar hails from Bahraich’s Gandara village, where he had no criminal history. According to the locals and police, he had gone to Pune to work at a scrap shop. However, it was only recently that he posted content flaunting his “gangster” status, police say, according to News18.
Jalandhar-resident Zeeshan, who brands himself as the “Zulmi of Crime World” has nearly two dozen members in his gang, as per NDTV. He was in contact with jailed gangster Lawrence Bishnoi’s brother, Anmol Bishnoi, using a “special app,” the report claimed citing records. He met Gurmail in Patiala jail, where he convinced him to join the Bishnoi gang.
According to the report, he was not in Mumbai during Siddique’s murder and coordinated the crime from outside.
While another key accused, Shubham, is suspected of having links with the Bishnoi gang, his brother Pravin is accused of “enlisting” two of the three alleged shooters who opened fire at Siddique.
It is also believed that it was Shubham, aka “Shubu Lonkar,” who claimed responsibility for the murder on Facebook and Instagram. He was reportedly under police watch till September last week after he was picked up for questioning after the firing incident outside Salman Khan’s Bandra residence in April.
However, he disappeared on September 24.
For those unaware, Shubham was arrested in January in Maharashtra’s Akola after police recovered more than 10 firearms from him. He was released later.
With inputs from agencies
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Baba Siddique murder: How gunmen used YouTube for training, Instagram for communication
