Chase to nab Udaipur murder accused: ‘They carried daggers… threatened to kill us, but we followed them’

The call was part of police’s efforts to pass on information about possible location of the accused to local residents and nab them before the two could escape far. The news of the murder had spread by then —across Udaipur and in adjacent districts — and videos filmed by the accused were being circulated on social media.

“When the two entered Deogarh that day, the first information we received was from a man from the minority community — he had seen the two accused drive past a local factory after 6.30 pm. Based on that information, we intimated local residents, including Chundawat, that the accused were nearby and that they should inform us the moment they spot the duo,” Shaitan Singh, SHO, Deogarh police station, told The Indian Express.

Deogarh is about 125 km northeast of Udaipur.

The police had informed Chundawat, like many others in the area, that the accused were riding a bike with registration number 2611. “Minutes after the phone call, I saw their motorcycle speed past,” Chundawat told the media in Jaipur on Tuesday.

Chundawat soon followed them on his motorcycle —his friend Shakti Singh, like him also a local farmer in his mid-twenties, rode pillion.

They were constantly updating local police.

“We tailed them for 3 or 4 km before the two realised they were being followed,” Chundawat said. “They brandished draggers and warned us not to follow them. They even threatened to kill us…but we continued to follow them.”

As they approached Bhim, a village nearly 30 km from Deogarh on the northeast direction, the accused “managed to give us the slip, as they drove through the local market”. But, Chundawat said, they soon spotted the two on a nearby highway and alerted the police.

“From Deogarh, they entered area under Bhim police station (jurisdiction), and we continued to chase them. Thereafter, we surrounded them from all sides and nabbed them,” SHO Singh said.

Chundawat and Shakti Singh met Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot on Monday evening, along with other leaders from the Rajput community, including Congress leader Dharmendra Rathore and Congress MLA from Bhim, Sudarshan Singh Rawat.

The Rajput community also felicitated them.

On Tuesday, the Shree Rajput Karni Sena (SRKS) sought government jobs for the duo for their heroics.

“We demand that government jobs be given to the two, who, although unarmed, followed the accused for 30 km and gave valuable inputs, helping the police arrest them. Our meeting with the Chief Minister was positive. We urge the state government to provide them adequate security cover because they might be targeted,” Mahipal Singh Makrana, national president of SRKS, said.

Congress MLAs from Bhim and Vallabhnagar, Sudarshan Singh Rawat and Preeti Shaktawat, respectively, seconded the demand for government jobs for Chundawat and Shakti Singh.