The Uttar Pradesh police on Tuesday claimed to have cracked the case of murder of sadhus in Aligarh. UP Police has nabbed five members of a gang from Etah who carried out murders of sadhus at the behest of Sabir Ali, a former councillor and an accused in the murder of a Muslim cleric in Aligarh which dates back to 2016. A convert to Islam, he is also known by his older name which is Dinesh Pratap from 35 years ago when he was a Hindu. Originally a member from the Dalit community, Sabir Ali had converted to Islam prior to him being elected as a councillor. His son Nadeem Ali and three other associates namely Salman, Irfan and Yaseen too have been arrested by the police. The criminals killing sadhus had carried out the crimes with the hope to implicate witnesses who were about to testify against Sabir in the case related to the murder of the Muslim cleric.
Sabir Ali and his gang of murderers had hoped that by targeted killings of sadhus the UP government could be given a bad name. The sadhus’ murders would also be promptly investigated under the incumbent BJP government in the state led by CM Yogi which would give them a better chance at implicating the witnesses. The gang had murdered two sadhus and a farmer on the 12th of August and then had attempted to murder another sadhu in Atrauli on 26th of August but the sadhu got away. Another sadhu was attacked by them on the intervening night of Saturday and Sunday, the sadhu miraculously survived by running away but a farmer and his wife were killed by them as they had seen the murderers hiding in the field. Their master plan included calling up the witnesses in the Muslim cleric case from the phone number of their victim in an attempt to provide a lead to the police thereby implicating them. They also scattered chits with names and numbers of the witnesses at the crime scene to leave nothing to chance.
Sabir Ali had a large piece of land in Etah district which he had donated to build a madrassa and had called a Muslim cleric to run the institution. Later on when the price of the land shot up he wanted the cleric to shut down the institution and leave the plot of land to Sabir Ali. When the cleric did not agree to his demands, Sabir hired the services of a contract killer and had him killed. It is this case which had driven them to engage in more crimes to hide the gruesomeness of their vile act.
The UP Police have done an excellent job by nabbing the five accused, thereby solving the case. Three members of the gang Mustkeem, Naushad and Afsar, are still on the run and the police have declared a cash prize of Rs 25,000 on each of them. The Director General of UP Police, Agra Zone Additional Director- General, Aligarh Deputy Inspector General and Senior Superintendent of Police have awarded the police team which nabbed the criminals with cash prizes of Rs 50,000, Rs 30,000, Rs 25,000 and Rs 20,000 respectively.