Youth arrested for helping goon flee police custody

A 26-year-old man has been arrested in west Delhi for allegedly aiding the escape of  a gangster from the custody of Uttarakhand Police in Uttar Pradesh last month.

Arvind Rohilla was arrested by a joint team of Delhi, Uttarakhand, and Uttar Pradesh police from Subhash Nagar late on Monday.

Arvind hails from Haryana’s Panipat district and is a member of Sunil Rathi gang.
Police said the gang had attacked a police team in UP’s Baghpat district to help gangster Amit Malik flee while he was being taken to a court for hearing of a murder case on December 15.

“A .32 bore pistol and four cartridges were seized from Arvind,” said a police officer, adding on the basis of information provided by him, an AK 47 assault rifle snatched from Uttarakhand Police has also been recovered from his home.

Arvind told police that his gang had fired indiscriminately and sprayed chilli powder at the police team before fleeing with Amit, who was being escorting from a Dehradun jail to a Baghpat court.

They had also snatched two AK 47 assault rifles and a Self Loading Rifle from the police team.

Five men of Uttarakhand Police, who were escorting Amit, were earlier booked for negligence.

After the shoot-out, a case was also registered with Fughana police station in UP.
The police team had reached Baghpat along with Amit by train around 6.30 am on December 15 and hired a vehicle for the district court.

On the way, two more passengers got into the vehicle.

While the vehicle was passing through a secluded area, an SUV overtook them.
Five men of the gang armed with country-made pistols got down and had fired indiscriminately at the policemen’s vehicle.

The gang also sprayed chilli powder on the policemen and forcibly took away handcuffed Amit.

However, local police had detained the policemen claiming that they were giving contradictory statements. They were later released.

Uttarakhand Police have announced a cash reward of Rs 10 lakh on information leading to Amit’s arrest. A 40-member joint team of Delhi, Uttarakhand and UP police has been tasked with arresting the gangster.