She almost got away with murder for hire, but an almost laughable mistake could result in jail for aspiring politician Babita Chaudhary. A wrong number dialled by a contract killer — to a policewoman — helped the police uncover the sordid plot behind the murder of Babita’s husband.The saga began on March 26, 2006, when Brijvir Chaudhary was killed by unidentified assailants while he was returning from his shop in Meerut’s Kanker Khera area. At the time, his ‘grieving’ wife Babita told the police that he had been murdered over a property dispute. On the basis of her allegations, the police even arrested two suspects. The matter would have ended there had one of the contract killers not decided to call up Babita to ask for the money she still owed him. What he didn’t know was that the person on the other end was Lal Kurti police station in-charge Inspector Alka Pawar.When she realised that the man was asking for supari money, Alka laid a trap for the killers by pretending to be Babita. She asked the caller to dress in a burkha and come to the railway station here to collect the remaining Rs 2.50 lakh in the Rs 3.50 lakh contract. The man, named Pawan, complied and was nabbed along with his friend Budri alias Arvind by the police .The hired killers spilled the beans and said they were paid only 1 lakh of the contract sum. Babita, they alleged, had “hitched up” with Manoj Yadav, an associate of gangster Ajay Jadeja. She then refused to pay them the remaining sum and threatened them with dire consequences if they demanded money. Meanwhile, Babita pursued her political aspirations — she had unsuccessfully contested the Meerut Corporation elections as a Rashtriya Lok Dal candidate before joining the Samajwadi Party.Incidentally, Babita is currently out on bail after being implicated in the murder of her husband’s brother, who was killed in June this year. He was shot while he was returning from a court hearing in his brother’s murder case. Babita was then arrested after her in-laws accused her of masterminding the crime. The police have admitted the men first arrested for the murder of Brijvir Chaudhary are not guilty. “They were innocent, the latest exposure has revealed,” said a police source. The police are now on the lookout for Babita and Manoj.
