Investigation into the death of Mansukh Hiren, the owner of the vehicle stuffed with around 20 gelatin sticks that was found outside Mukesh Ambani’s house Antilla in Mumbai, will be done by the National Investigation Agency (NIA). The case was on Monday transferred from Maharashtra's Anti Terrorism Squad to the NIA. This comes after Maharashtra Home Minister Anil Deshmukh on Monday said the state police were "capable" of solving the case. The body of Hiren (46), an automobile accessories dealer, was found in a creek in Thane on March 5, hours after he went “missing”. The car, a Scorpio, with 20 gelatin sticks inside was found near ‘Antilia’, the multi-storey residence of Mukesh Ambani in south Mumbai, on February 25. Police had said the vehicle was stolen from Airoli-Mulund Bridge on February 18. Making a statement in the state Assembly, Deshmukh said after Hiran’s wife expressed suspicion that her husband may have been murdered, the ATS registered a case against unidentified persons under IPC Sections 302 (murder), 20 (causing disappearance of evidence of offence) and (b)(criminal conspiracy). Deshmukh added that an appropriate probe was being conducted into the entire case. “The Maharashtra Police are capable of solving the case. The Anti-Terrorism Squad (ATS) has begun its probe into it,” he said. Earlier, talking to reporters in the Vidhan Bhavan complex, Leader of Opposition in the Assembly Devendra Fadnavis said the state government should be ashamed of itself for failing to provide protection to Hiran. “I was insisting from day one that Hiran’s life was in danger…the ATS, which has now taken over the probe has filed a case of murder and causing disappearance of evidence. Hiran was a key witness in this investigation,” Fadnavis claimed. Something fishy, says CM Uddhav Thackeray Maharashtra Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray has said the NIA taking over the case of a vehicle laden with explosives being found near industrialist Mukesh Ambani's residence in Mumbai suggests something was "fishy". Talking to reporters here, Thackeray said governments come and go, but the official administrative machinery remains the same and one needs to trust it. Thackeray said, "We had handed over the case of the vehicle laden with explosives and the mysterious death of Mansukh Hiran to the ATS. The NIA taking over the case shows something was fishy."
