Businessman shot near home, wife alleges his brother’s role

GURUGRAM: A 46-year-old businessman died after he was shot at near his house in Islampur village here on Tuesday night.

Police said Ram Karan, alias Tony, had taken one bullet that hit him in the back, passed through the ribs and got stuck in the chest.

He succumbed to his injuries at Medanta Hospital on Wednesday morning.

Tony’s widow Laxmi Devi, who also happened to be the lone eyewitness in this murder, alleged Tony’s elder brother Subhash, his wife Usha and his two sons Vikas and Nicky were behind the murder of her husband. According to her, there had been a dispute between the two families over an ancestral plot, and Subhash and his wife had threatened Tony recently. However, police are yet to arrest anyone in this regard.

According to Laxmi, she and her husband were returning home from their tent shop, barely a kilometre away, around 10pm when two assailants on a bike attacked him. Tony was on his scooter, while Laxmi was following him on foot.

“It was raining and there was no light on the street. Though I could not see their faces clearly, the men appeared to be in their twenties. They fired at him from close range and disappeared in the dark. My husband fell on the road,” Laxmi said in her statement to police. She then rushed her husband to hospital, where he died later.

According to Laxmi, the two brothers had reached an agreement to share the property earlier but later Subhash and his wife refused to accept the verbal settlement.

Subhash Bokan, a spokesperson for the Gurugram police, said an FIR had been filed under sections 302 (murder) and 120B (conspiracy) against unknown person. “The deceased’s wife alleged that Subhash and his family had been issuing threats and they were behind the murder. We are probing their involvement.”

Investigation officer SI Rajesh Kumar said, “It is a case of murder and we are looking into all aspects, including the alleged property dispute.”