Pune: 4 held for attack on prisoner at Sassoon General Hospital

PUNE: The Bund Garden police arrested four men with criminal antecedents around Tuesday midnight in connection with the murder attempt on Tushar Hambir (35), an organized crime detenu and member of a right-wing organisation, at a ward in the Sassoon General Hospital's new building on Monday night.

The police recovered a sword, chopper, country-made pistol and a live cartridge used in the crime from the arrested four, all from Hadapsar.
Deputy commissioner of police (Zone II) Sagar Patil said, "Acting on a tip-off, we arrested Sagar Hanumant Ovhal (22), his brother, Balaji (23), Suraj Shaikh (19) and Sagar Atole (21) from a house at Panmala on Sinhagad Road where they were hiding. All of them are members of Hambir's rival gang. Members from either gang have clashed against each other several times in the past."
The police are continuing with their search for the fifth man involved in the attack and said old rivalry has emerged as the prima facie motive behind the assault. The Ovhal brothers are members of a gang in Hadapsar which was once led by Sujit Verma, who was murdered by the Hambir gang members in 2017, a police officer said, adding that the rivlary has since been festering.
On Monday night, a police guard had injured his shoulder while attempting to prevent the attackers from reaching the bed occupied by Hambir, who was shifted from the Yerawada central jail to the Sassoon hospital on August 25 for the treatment of a backbone ailment that affected his gait.
Hambir was detained in 2016 under the Maharashtra Control of Organised Crime Act (MCOCA) after his alleged involvement in the murder of Hemant Gaikwad, a political party's youth-wing leader, in September 2015 and has been in jail since then.
Senior inspector Pratap Mankar of the Bund Garden police said, "Sagar Ovhal has five criminal cases - property and body offences - to his name. His brother, Balaji, has two cases against him. The other two also have property and body offences registered against them."
On how the five attackers came to know about Hambir's presence at the Sassoon hospital, DCP Patil said, "The Ovhal brothers and their aides were after another member of Hambir's gang. It was then they realised that the gang member was frequenting the Sassoon hospital. While following him, they came to know that Hambir was admitted to the hospital and decided to eliminate him."
A senior police officer said, "Ovhals' father is also admitted to the Sassoon hospital for a kidney ailment and they realised that Hambir's men were frequently visiting the health hub. This way, they got information about Hambir's presence in the hospital."
Patil said, "We are still questioning the arrested four men on how they managed to enter the hospital premises with arms. We will also probe how the security lapses took place on the hospital premises."
Apart from Mankar, inspector Ashwini Satpute, assistant inspector Rahul Pawar and constables Mohan Kale, Nitin Jagtap, Sudhir Ghotkule, Anil Kusalkar, Sagar Ghorpade and Amol Sarade were part of the police team that made the arrests.
The 1,500-bed state run hospital has about 10,000 footfalls daily. This includes patients, their relatives and other visitors.