New Delhi, Jul 14 (IANS): The blind murder of a lift operator, who was stabbed multiple times after a scuffle over some petty issue in south Delhi’s Pul Prahladpur has been solved and three accused arrested, a Delhi Police official said on Friday.

The accused were identified as Manoj Kumar, 22, a resident of Loni in Ghaziabad, Subhash, 21, and Vivek alias Raja, 23, both residents of Haryana's Faridabad.

On Monday, Vikash Kumar (26), a resident of Bihar's Saran and working as a lift operator at foot over bridge near Shiv Mandir, was stabbed to death by an unknown person.

Deputy Commissioner of Police, Southeast, Rajesh Deo said that during investigation, technical as well as manual intelligence was mounted to get clues about the criminals as there was no CCTV footage at the place of the crime.

“Hence, CCTV of the surrounding area was scanned thoroughly. The painstaking efforts of the team yielded results when during scanning of CCTV footage, one of the accused was found escaping on a bike and two others were found running towards Shiv Mandir soon after the incident,” he said.

On the basis of the route followed by the unknown culprits, around 300-350 CCTV cameras of the area were checked and it was found that all three were finally entering Trim Hotel situated at Sharma Market in the area.

“During further scanning of CCTV footage of the hotel and local enquiry, all the three accused persons were identified and raids were conducted at their respective residences but all of them found absconding,” said the DCP.

“Manoj and Subhash were nabbed near Khurja in Uttar Pradesh while Vivek was arrested from Jaipur,” he added.

On interrogation, the accused confessed that a scuffle between accused Subhash and lift operator took place on MB Road near the MCD toilet regarding their standing near the lift.

“In order to take revenge, Subhash called his friends Manoj and Vivek, who were drinking in the nearby Trim Hotel, at their common friend’s birthday party. Both of them came to the spot and along with Subhash, stabbed Vikash. They further disclosed that after the murder, they ran away from there and threw away the dagger,” the official added.