Moosewala murder: Pune cops invoke stringent MCOCA against gangster Santosh Jadhav

In the first weeks of June, the names of Jadhav and another Pune resident Siddhesh Kamble, 19, alias Saurav alias Mahakal had cropped up in the murder of the Punjabi singer, who was shot dead on May 29 in Punjab. The Pune Rural police who were already looking out for Jadhav in another murder case since August 2021 intensified their manhunt. They had arrested Jadhav and his aide from two villages in Kutch on June 12.

The investigators initially arrested Mahakal from Pune-Ahmednagar district border on June 7.

In a subsequent probe, the Pune rural police recovered as many as 13 country-made pistols from the gang members of Jadhav The investigation revealed that the members in Jadhav’s gang from Pune went to Sendhwa in Madhya Pradesh and had procured the firearms from people linked to Lawrence Bishnoi gang. Hence Jadhav’s  link in Moosewala’s murder on May 29 is being probed.

After Jadhav’s custody for the 2021 murder ended, the police took his custody for the alleged role in a case of extorting money from a businessman in Narayangaon area. The police have now invoked MCOCA in the case against Jadhav and his nine gang members, including a minor. Eight of them are currently languishing in Yerwada Prison under judicial custody in the same offence. A report in this regard was sent through Pune Rural Superintendent of Police Abhinav Deshmukh to Special Inspector General (Kolhapur Range) Manojkumar Lohiya. The MCOCA provisions were added to the extortion case after the approval from Lohiya, officers said. They said that the police from Delhi and Punjab were expected to seek the custody of Jadhav for further investigation into the Moosewala case.

Jadhav has earlier been booked under MCOCA in connection with the murder of criminal Onkar Bankhele alias Ranya who was shot dead in broad daylight in the Manchar area of Pune on August 1, 2021. Earlier, Jadhav was booked for attempt to murder and extortion in addition to Bankhele’s murder.

After the arrest of Jadhav from Kutch, Additional Director General of Police (ADGP) Kulwant Kumar Sarangal had told the media in Pune that the Bishnoi gang has its footprints in Maharashtra and that the state police were exchanging information with Punjab and Delhi police in this regard. After Jadhav’s arrest, a team from Pune Rural had gone to Delhi and had interrogated Bishnoi about his links with Jadhav, Mahakal and some other suspects from Maharashtra.

Congress leader and singer Shubhdeep Singh Sidhu alias Sidhu Moosewala was gunned down near Mansa in Punjab on May 29, days after the Punjab government reduced his security cover along with many others in the state. The Punjab police had said 27-year-old Moosewala was shot at while he was driving his SUV in Jawahar Ke village along with two others. He was rushed to the Mansa Civil Hospital where he was declared dead.