Bootlegger, four aides get life term for murdering cop in Rajkot

RAJKOT: A bootlegger and four of his associates were sentenced on Friday to life imprisonment for the murder of a policeman in Devnagar on Kuvadava Road in Rajkot in 2013.
According to the details of the case, Haka Bhakhodia, the bootlegger, and his aides - Pravin Koli, Ranjeet Koli, Bhavesh Koli and Vanraj Koli - had stabbed Pramod Awadhvasi (35), a constable with Kuwadava Road police station on March 27, 2013.
Awadhvasi was murdered as he he had gone to raid Bhakhodia premises after getting information about liquor trade. After killing him, the accused dragged his body to the roadside on Rajkot-Ahmedabad highway and dumped his motorcycle too near the body to make it look like an accident.
All the accused were arrested on March 28 after the blood trail from Awadhvasi’s body led the investigators to the house of the bootlegger, said public prosecutor Smita Atri.
“They found blood splattered on the floor. Also found were the blood-stained clothes of the accused which they had failed to dispose. When Bhakhodia and the co-accused were arrested, they confessed to the crime,” said Atri.
On March 27 evening, Awadhvasi had told his colleague Dahya Sura that he was going to conduct a liquor raid in Devnagar as he had received a tip-off.
On the same day night, Sura received a message about Awadhvasi’s body lying by the roadside of Rajkot-Ahmedabad highway in a pool of blood.
The Rajkot additional sessions judge court pronounced the judgement after taking into record 42 witnesses, 100 documentary evidences and circumstantial evidence.