‘Killers got supari for Hazare’

The two men arrested for the murder of Congress politician Pawanraje Nimbalkar in 2006 are suspected to have been offered a supari (contract) of Rs25 lakh to eliminate anti-corruption crusader Kisan ‘Anna’ Hazare.

The crime branch of the Mumbai Police had earlier claimed that Dombivli resident Parasmal Badala alias Paras Jain, 47, and Dinesh Tiwari, 37, from Gorakhpur in Uttar Pradesh, were paid Rs30 lakh to kill Nimbalkar. The two were arrested in February and have reportedly confessed to the crime.

Two motorcycle-borne men had gunned down Nimbalkar and his driver Samad Qazi near Kalamboli on the Mumbai-Pune expressway on June 3, 2006. The Kalamboli police conducted the initial investigation. In October 2008, the Bombay High Court transferred the case to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI).

Though crime branch officers were tight-lipped about the alleged plot to kill Hazare, it is believed that the “inputs” have been forwarded to the CBI.

The two suspects are believed to have given a statement to crime branch officers that a private sugar distillery operator, through a third person, offered Rs25 lakh as supari to kill Hazare after the social activist exposed a financial scam involving his distillery in 2006. The distillery unit at the sugar factory is owned by a politician.