The Belagavi district Karnataka Control of Organised Crime Act (KCOCA) court sentenced Bannanje Raja and seven others to life imprisonment for the murder of R.N. Nayak, a mining industrialist. Another person was sentenced to 13 years’ imprisonment.
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C M Joshi, principal district and sessions judge and judge of the KCOCA court, pronounced the judgment in Belagavi on April 4. The judgment was read out in the court in the presence of lawyers and others.
Some of the accused had shot Nayak multiple times while he was sitting in his car in front of his house in 2013. A day after the murder, Bannanje Raja had called newspaper offices to claim that he had ordered the hit.
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Ankola police had filed a charge sheet saying that 16 persons had planned and executed the murder of M Nayak, after he refused to pay protection money to Bannanje Raja.
Of the 16 accused, three are absconding. Police Constable Ramesh Gowda, who was deputed to guard Nayak, had shot and killed one of the accused, Vikas Upadhyaya from Uttar Pradesh. The other 12 were arrested by the Karnataka police and produced in court. Bannanje Raja was arrested in Morocco.
According to the police, Rajendra Shetty, also known as Bannanje Raja, had called Nayak demanding protection money. When Nayak refused to pay, he got some criminals to kill the industrialist.
A few days ago, the court had found nine of the 12 accused guilty.
“It is the first case to be filed under KCOC Act in Karnataka. It is one of the many rarely-used laws. Only 16 cases have been filed under the Act so far,’’ a police officer said.