Mum, Jan. 6 (IANS): The Pune Police have arrested at least eight persons said to be linked to the broad daylight killing of notorious gangster Sharad H. Mohol and also recovered some arms and ammunition from the accused, officials said here on Saturday.
The suspects were caught on the Pune-Bengaluru highway while trying to flee the district late Friday night in two vehicles. They will be produced before a Magistrate Court later Saturday.
As per police investigations by nine separate teams, the 40-year-old local goon was shot by one of his associates and other accomplices over a financial dispute, and further investigations are on.
The police have recovered three country-made pistols, three magazines and five cartridges, as well as the two getaway cars from the accused.
The shootout took place outside Mohol’s office-cum-residence in Pandurang Wadi of the Sutardara area of Kothrud on Friday at around 1.15 p.m.
CCTV footage that emerged on Saturday shows how Moho was reportedly celebrating his wedding anniversary, had lunch with his associates, then stepped out of his home and they suddenly started shooting him in a narrow lane.
An aide of Mohol standing nearby, displayed presence of mind to run towards one of the shooters and even tried to catch him, but all of them fled the scene.
Then, the aide and another one helped the profusely bleeding Mohol up on his feet and rushed him to the nearby Sahyadri Hospital.
Of the four rounds fired, Mohol was hit by three bullets, two in the right shoulder and one in the chest that went through the heart, officials said.
The prime suspect in Mohol’s killing is one Sahil Polekar, alias Munna, a local resident, and the tentative motive is said to be the outcome of an intra-gang rivalry arising from some financial disputes, Police Commissioner Retesh Kumaarr told mediapersons on Friday night.
After the shootout, Mohol’s aide Arun Dhumal filed a complaint with the Kothrud Police Station which lodged the FIR invoking sections of murder, conspiracy, arms act, and set up nine probe teams.
The gangster was once an accused in the alleged killing of Indian Mujahideen (IM) terrorist Qateel Siddique in the Yerawada Central Jail premises, but was later acquitted in 2019.
However, Mohol had remained in jail for another 2010 murder case for nearly 11 years till he secured bail from the Supreme Court in 2021, pending his plea against the conviction.
In July 2022, he was externed from Pune district for six months and had been earlier detained twice under the stringent MCOCA, besides facing 14 manor criminal cases pertaining to murder, murder attempt, extortion, abduction, among others.
Incidentally, Mohol’s wife, Swati had joined the Bharatiya Janata Party in April 2013 and was welcomed by Minister Chandrakant Patil to the party fold.
Deputy Chief Minister and state Home Minister Devendra Fadnavis, who was in Pune on Friday, asserted that Mohol was killed by his own associates and “the government takes strong action against goons and nobody would dare wage gang-wars here”.
Mohol is survived by his wife, ason, mother and a brother.
He marked his wedding anniversary on Friday when he was killed, and had also planned to go to a temple near his residence in the adjoining lane.
Hailing from a farmer’s family, he was earlier the driver of his elder brother and gangster Sandip Mohol, who was shot dead in October 2006 by a rival mafia gang.
Later, Sharad Mohol took over the gang and avenged his brother’s murder by killing gangster Kishore Marne, who was among the suspects in the Sandip Mohol shootout.