MUMBAI: The Mumbai police crime branch has arrested seven more persons in connection with the firing incident outside film producer and director Rohit Shetty’s residence on February 1, taking the total number of arrests in the case to 12.
The seven accused were arrested on Thursday in a joint operation with the Uttar Pradesh and Haryana police special task forces, police officers familiar with the probe said on Monday. Four of them including 24-year old Deepak Ramesh Chandra Sharma who allegedly fired five rounds outside Shetty’s home were arrested from Haryana, while the remaining three were arrested from Uttar Pradesh, the officers mentioned.
All seven accused – Deepak Sharma, Sonu Thakur, Sunny Kumar, Ritik Kumar, Jatin Bharadwaj, Vishal Balakram and Vishnu Kushwaha – were produced in court after being brought to the city and have been remanded in police custody till February 25, said Lakhmi Gautam, joint commissioner of police, crime branch.
“Since the accused had switched off their mobile phones after the firing incident, we worked both manually and technically to nab them,” Gautam said. “Among those arrested, Deepak Sharma had fired at least five rounds at Shetty Tower (Rohit Shetty’s 10-storeyed residence) using a semi-automatic pistol.”
Ten police teams were formed to track the accused in the field while other officers followed technical leads, the joint commissioner said. These teams left the city on February 1 itself, following the trail of the accused based on footage from CCTV cameras. The teams had details of the accuseds’ relatives and friends and were able to track them down using technical support and questioning auto and taxi drivers, Gautam noted.
Vishnu Kushwaha, a resident of Bijouli village in Uttar Pradesh’s Agra district and one of the seven arrested accused, was assigned the task of executing the firing outside Shetty’s house at the behest of alleged gangster and associate of the Lawrence Bishnoi gang Shubham Lonkar, a statement issued by the UP STF on Monday said.
Kushwaha had earlier worked for Lonkar’s alleged associate Golu Pandit, who was still in touch with the fugitive gangster via the Signal app, the statement noted. Most of the seven arrested accused had criminal backgrounds; they had met each other in jail, then came in touch with Pandit, and agreed to take up the job as they wanted to become famous in the world of crime, the UP STF statement noted.
Trail of events
According to investigators, four arrested accused were directly involved in executing the attack. Sonu Thakur, 23, was well-aware of Mumbai’s topography as he had stayed in the city for two years while Sunny Kumar, Deepak Sharma and an absconding accused arrived in Mumbai on January 18 and recced Shetty Tower multiple times before the firing incident.
On the night of January 31, Sonu and Deepak travelled from Kalyan to Juhu on a scooter. They drank alcohol at a wine shop, after which Sonu left for Juhu beach while Deepak went to Shetty Tower and fired five rounds from a 7.62 bore semi-automatic pistol provided to him.
Deepak and Sonu then fled from the spot on the scooter, left it outside Vile Parle railway station, and travelled to Thane in an auto. From Thane, they took another auto to Kalyan, met Sunny and the absconding accused mentioned earlier, and took an express train to Agra.
In Agra, the four accused stayed at a factory where 22-year-old Ritik Kumar, among those arrested in the joint operation, worked. Later, they took around ₹1,500 from arrested accused Jatin Bhardwaj and travelled to Delhi, Ghaziabad and Noida where they stayed in the house of Vishal Balkram, also among the arrested accused.
Preliminary interrogation indicated that all seven arrested accused were school or college drop-outs.
“They are fond of making reels and some of the reels even featured weapons. They carried out the firing for a very small sum as they were keen to work for Lonkar and his gang,” an officer familiar with the probe said, requesting anonymity.
Though the police have not found any direct connection yet between the 12 arrested accused and incarcerated gangster Lawrence Bishnoi, they have named a few of Bishnoi’s alleged aides as absconding accused in the case, the officer stated. They include Shubham Lonkar, who is wanted in connection with the October 2024 murder of former Maharashtra minister Baba Siddique, his brother Pravin Lonkar, Golu Pandit and an unidentified accused who recced Shetty’s house.
The crime branch had earlier arrested five Pune residents for providing logistical support for the firing incident, including the scooter used by the shooter to reach Shetty Tower and thereafter to flee from the spot.