After being on the run for almost three months, Muneer, the main accused in the murder of National Investigation Agency (NIA) officer Tanzil Ahmed , was nabbed by a Special Task Force team of the Uttar Pradesh police from Bishrakh in Noida on Tuesday morning.
A close associate of Muneer, Adnan Shakeel, was also taken into custody. Muneer was hiding at Adnan’s apartment at Crossing Republik in Ghaziabad for the past few days.
The police recovered a motorcycle, Rs. 90,000 in cash and three pistols, including a 9-mm service revolver that Muneer had stolen in 2015 from the gunner of a judge in Lucknow.
“Three teams of UP police, including STF Agra, STF Noida and Aligarh police have been tracking Muneer for the last two months.
When he was intercepted near a temple in the Bishrakh Thana area, the police asked him to surrender but he started firing at them. When the police retaliated, he panicked and dropped his weapon,” said Senior Superintendent of Police [STF West] Amit Pathak.
The police clarified that Mr. Ahmed’s murder had nothing to do with any terror probe and he was killed because of a grudge that Muneer and his friend Rehan (a relative of the slain officer) had against him.
Earlier attempts also
Preliminary investigations suggest that Muneer, who was wanted in numerous criminal cases including murder and bank robbery, feared that the Mr. Ahmed would get him arrested as he had got a whiff of his “acts”. He also suspected the NIA officer of being a police informer and made several attempts to murder him near his house, said the police.
Described as a “shrewd criminal” by the police, Muneer carried a reward of Rs 2 lakh on his head.
After murdering Mr. Ahmed and his wife, he hid in various places, including Lucknow, Azamgarh and Nepal, and was on the verge of fleeing to Mumbai when he was nabbed.
In his statement to the police, Muneer cited anxiety of being arrested as the main reason for his contempt for Mr. Ahmed.
He said he hailed from Mr. Ahmed’s native village in Bijnore and knew the officer through Rehan.
He suspected that the officer was leaking information to the police on his gang members.
“My boys informed me that it was Tanzil Ahmed who acted as an informer in the arrest of (his close aide) Ashutosh (Mishra) in the Kamla Nagar bank robbery case. Rehan and Tanzim, who were picked up by police, warned me that Tanzil Ahmed had been an informer in the case and would get me arrested too.
When I confronted Tanzil Ahmed, he said I must be doing some wrong acts.
That is when I decided to eliminate him,” the police statement citing Muneer said.
“For six days Muneer recced Mr. Ahmed’s residence with a loaded gun. On April 2 he got to know that the officer had gone to a marriage ceremony and decided to attack him,” said Mr. Pathak.
The police clarified that Tanzil Ahmed’s murder had nothing to do with any terror probe
