Man gets himself killed for money

He had insurance policies of Rs 77 lakh; hired contract killers for the job

 He had a debt of Rs 45 lakh and insurance policies worth Rs 77 lakh. The arithmetic was simple — Claim the insurance and pay the debt. But there was a catch. He would have to get himself killed.

And he did exactly that.In a bizarre happening, a trader who was deep in debt and being hounded by creditors, allegedly gave supari, a contract for getting himself killed, in Uttar Pradesh’s Lakhimpur-Kheri town, so that his family could claim the insurance, pay the debt and live in peace.

The contract killers did their job and Harish Gupta, a readymade garment merchant was done away with. Police recovered his body at a nearby Illapurwa village in the district on September 20. The post-mortem report revealed that the trader had been strangled.

After examining the call details of victim’s cellphone, police nabbed Shatrohan, who was a good friend of the deceased. During interrogation, Shatrohan revealed the chilling details. He told police that Gupta had made a plan to get himself killed in order to ensure that his family could get rid of the debt by claiming insurance. Shatrohan added that Gupta was very upset as he was being hounded by the creditors. But he had no money to repay the Rs 45 lakh loan.

“He told me he had an insurance cover of Rs 77 lakh which could be used to repay the loan and asked me to arrange someone who could kill him,” Shatrohan said.
Shatrohan was initially reluctant but agreed later when he was given Rs 10,000 for the job. “I arranged a supari killer for Gupta,” he said. The killer identified as Ram Asrey strangled Gupta on September 19 night, he said.District police officials, who divulged the details on Friday, said they were trying to trace Ram Asrey.

The saddest part is that Gupta may not get the insurance money now once it is established that he conspired to get himself killed.