15 musclemen on Namdhari's payroll, helped grab property

Sacked Uttarakhand Minorities Commission chairman Sukhdev Singh Namdhari has around 15 musclemen on his payroll, police have found.

Police are still looking for all the musclemen who were involved in taking possession of the farmhouses of Hardeep Chadha, one of the brothers killed in the Chattarpur shoot-out. Namdhari allegedly shot at Hardeep.

“Namdhari has around 15 musclemen on his payrolls and their prime job is to threaten, beat and scare people. He along with his musclemen is involved in many land-grabbing cases in Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand,” said a police officer. While some of them were hired on a monthly salary, other were on contract, being paid according to the work done by them.

The officer said some 14 cases have been registered against Namdhari and his men in Uttarakhand. Thirteen of them were land-grabbing cases in which firearms were also used.
In these cases, he and his men were  booked under section 307 (attempt to murder), section 452 (trespassing with the intent to cause hurt or wrongful restraint) and the Arms Act.
Meanwhile, police have also found Namdhari’s personal security officer Sachin Tyagi’s role in the gunfight suspicious, and he could also be booked for attempt for murder.

Tyagi too fired at Hardeep. But it is yet to be probed what circumstances led him to open fire: whether his intention was to save Namdhari or he fired at Namdhari’s insistence.
“He has not been given a clean chit yet,” said the officer.

Earlier, investigators found some ‘circumstantial evidence’ contrary to Namdhari’s narration and Tyagi’s statement on the shoot-out.  “The investigation into the matter is still on and many things have to be still verified,” said the officer.