Gauri Lankesh Murder: SIT Arrests a Hindu Yuva Sene Activist

Amidst the BJP using the murder of Kannada tabloid editor Gauri Lankesh to target the ruling Congress government in the state over law and order, the Special Investigation Team (SIT) has taken into custody a Hindu Yuva Sene activist on Friday.

Lankesh, the Editor of "Lankesh Patrike" with strong anti-right wing views, was shot dead outside her residence in the city's southwestern suburb by unidentified assailants on September 5, 2017, by unidentified men.

The arrest of a 37-year-old local gun supplier, KT Navin Kumar, has taken place six months after the murder of Lankesh. The SIT team who was probing the case since September 5, 2017, arrested Kumar under the Arms Act for illegal possession of ammunition, after informing magistrate’s court in Bengaluru that the team had found enough evidence of Kumar’s involvement in the case.

"K.T. Naveen Kumar was taken into custody by a Special Investigation Team (SIT) of the Karnataka Police," SIT Investigating Officer M.N. Anucheth told IANS.

Pointing out the ideological root of Hindu Yuva Sene, one of the editors of Gauri Lankesh Patrike Shivsundar spoke to Newsclick that it is clearly a Hindutva radical outfit which linked to Sanatan Sanstha and the Hindu Janajagruti Samiti.

“From the very first beginning itself it is clear that the right-wing people, whether it’s directly or indirectly affiliated to RSS, had killed Gauri,” said Shivsundar.

Kumar, who hails from Birur town in Chikmagalur district, about 250km west from Bengaluru, was booked by the city police on February 19 under the Arms Act for illegal possession of 15 bullets of a revolver, Anucheth added.

The man had been remanded in Crime Branch custody, which ended on Friday.

"Based on certain clues provided by him, the SIT took him into custody for further questioning and investigation," he said.

Earlier, on February 18, Upparpet police arrested Kumar on a crime branch official’s complaint which stated that Kumar was caught with bullets in the city bus stand. During the investigation, it has been found that more than 15 rounds of the cartridges of the .32 calibre, same as the 7.65 mm cartridges, were in possession of Kumar.

Apart from this, a forensic analysis suggested that Gauri Lankesh and Kannada research scholar MM Kalburgi were shot with a same 7.65 mm pistol. The forensic report was based on the analysis of four empty cartridges and four bullets which was used to fire at Lankesh and the bullets and cartridges fired to kill Kalburgi on August 30, 2015. The report also noticed the similarities in bullets and cartridges.