On murder night, Dubey vehicle didn’t move and a likely witness disappeared

A senior Gaya police officer said Dubey, after he landed at the Gaya railway station on November 27, phoned home twice to check why his vehicle hadn’t reached the station. His domestic help Mahesh Paswan told him there seemed to be some problem with the vehicle ignition but it would soon be reaching the station.

The first call came at 3.25 am. Dubey called a second time at 3.39 am. His vehicle still hadn’t reached and he told Mahesh he was heading home on his own.

But Dilip Kumar Tiwari, a Bihar armed policeman guarding businessman Joy Kumar Jain’s house opposite the Circuit House, who first spotted Dubey’s body, told police he heard what sounded like two explosions and immediately looked at his watch: it was 3.45 am. He looked at another watch and it had the same time. He said he saw smoke and as it cleared, the body was visible.

The police say it’s impossible to cover that distance from the station in six minutes.

A rickshaw-puller who probably knows

Dubey’s help Mahesh, the driver of the vehicle which wouldn’t start, and another man from the Oriental Structural Engineers (one of the contractors for the road project), who lived close to Dubey’s house, decided

to look for him after he didn’t reach home.

But as they stepped out, they saw a rickshaw-puller, a cloth over his head. He was pulling the rickshaw, not pedalling, and seemed to be in great hurry. But when he saw them, he mumbled: ‘‘Kisi ko mar dala, kisi ko mar dala (someone has been killed).’’ Mahesh and the other two panicked and rushed towards the station. But they soon returned, looking for the rickshaw-puller to check where had the murder taken place. The rickshaw-puller had disappeared. They again set out on the road to the station. They hadn’t gone far when they spotted a body. Mahesh confirmed it was Dubey’s. The police have been trying to trace the rickshaw-puller but have had no luck so far.

Missing fuse, stalled vehicle

The police say they now know why the Tata Sumo, supposed to be at the station to fetch Dubey, wouldn’t move: two fuses were missing. The Tata Sumo (registration number BR-2C-1539) was just two years old and never had any problem.

Dubey’s driver was on leave for Id and Gammon India, supposed to provide a vehicle and driver to NHAI, had sent in a replacement, Brij Kishore Ram. Police said Brij couldn’t explain the missing fuses.

The police are now calling engineers to establish whether the vehicle had been tampered with.