In a major embarrassment to Mumbai city crime branch, an alleged weapons supplier in the actor Salman Khan firing case, Anuj Thapan (32), was found dead in the lockup of police headquarters at Crawford Market last week. A senior police officer said it is suspected that he committed suicide, but his family alleged foul play.
Joint commissioner of police (crime) Lakhmi Gautam said the state CID will conduct an inquiry into the death. The lockup, split across two floors of an old building on the premises, had 11 inmates, but crime branch officials said two of them - Vikas Gupta and Sagar Pal, who allegedly fired at Khan’s residence on April 14 - were taken away for interrogation. They were mum on why Thapan alone was left behind.
The second alleged guns supplier, Subhash Chander, is in judicial custody owing to an old injury. The building is covered by CCTV cameras. It is the first case of custodial death inside the police headquarters in recent years.
Police said around 12.30 pm, an officer in charge of the lockup was conducting his routine check on the first floor when another inmate told him that Thapan had gone to the toilet but hadn’t returned. The officer found Thapan and rushed him to GT Hospital, where doctors declared him dead. His body was later sent to JJ Hospital for an autopsy.
Police registered an accidental death report, and later, CID officials conducted a panchnama and secured the CCTV footage from the site.
Thapan, who hails from Punjab and was nabbed from the state on April 24, was accused along with Subhash Chander of supplying two country-made pistols and 40 cartridges to Gupta and Pal in Mumbai on behalf of Anmol Bishnoi, the Canada-based cousin of jailed gangster Lawrence Bishnoi. A lookout circular has been issued against Anmol and police are hoping to gain custody of Lawrence from the Gujarat jail he is lodged in.
Police fear Thapan’s death could dilute the stringent Maharashtra Control of Organised Crime Act (MCOCA) charge that was invoked after the case was transferred from crime branch unit 9 to assistant commissioner of police S Nade. For an MCOCA charge to hold, police need to show that an accused had been named in another chargesheet within the last 10 years. Thapan has been named in three other unrelated offences in Punjab.
