Karni Sena chief murder: Miscommunication forced shooters to change escape plan, led to arrest

New Delhi: A "miscommunication" between the alleged shooters of Karni Sena chief Sukhdev Singh Gogamedi and their handlers over the escape plan from Rajasthan's Jaipur after the killing led to their arrest, according to Delhi Police officials.

Shooters Rohit Rathore and Nitin Fauji were supposed to get out of Jaipur immediately by boarding a truck after killing Gogamedi on December 5, they said.

However, they could not because of a "miscommunication" between them and their handlers over the vehicle's location, forcing the accused to come up with an alternative escape plan that involved using several vehicles and hiding at different locations, the officials said.

Rathore and Nitin Fauji were arrested in a joint operation of the Delhi Police Crime Branch and the Rajasthan Police from a hotel in Chandigarh, five days after the incident.

Talking to PTI, an official, aware of the developments in the investigation, said that according to a plan, "the duo were supposed to board a truck arranged by their handlers soon after killing Gogamedi".

The truck would have taken Rathore and Nitin Fauji to "somewhere out of Jaipur but they could not find the vehicle", the official said and added that when they again contacted their handlers, they were told that they were at a location far away from the truck. 

The official said Rathore and Nitin Fauji, then, stole a scooty to move and hid in a farm near the Jaipur-Ajmer bypass for at least an hour, waiting for a message from their handlers. They were in contact with their handlers on the Signal app, the official said on the condition of anonymity. 

"While at the field, they met with farmers, whom they told that they were students and had lost their way," the official said.  When they did not get any reply from their handlers, they made their own plan and hired a taxi for Didwana and further took a bus, a train and another taxi to move to Hisar, then Manali and finally reach Chandigarh, the official added. 

The officials said the attackers were in contact with Virender Charan, who provided them arms through couriers on the direction of Rohit Godara, a close associate of the Lawrence-Goldy Brar criminal gang. 

Charan and Godara, both are suspected to be hiding in European countries, sources said. 

Godara, was the one who claimed responsibility for Gogamedi's killing in a Facebook post, saying the Karni Sena chief was backing his enemies.

The officials said Rathore and Nitin Fauji were promised passports and visas within 20 days of the incident to flee the country, but till then they had to remain in hiding.  Godara, a former LLB student who was earlier arrested in a case of rape in Rajasthan, believed that he went to jail because of Gogamedi. Nitin Fauji, who quit the Indian Army after he was named in a kidnapping case in Haryana, wanted to settle abroad, the officials said.