Anup Babu was victimized by land mafias: 'real estate' investment was in the backdrop : Sambalpur SP

Sanjay Ghose in the middle

The shadow in the much hyped mysterious killing of Anup Babu was uncovered after the arrest of dreaded land mafia Sanjay Ghose who was masterminded in his brutal killing. Anup, an eminent social activist and super class  contractor of Sambalpur was hacked on 7th of this month at Sakhipara area. Disclosing before the media persons on Tuesday, SP (Sambalpur) Asheet Panigrahi revealed that before coming in contact with the deceased, accused Sanjay had duped many persons in various places in the name of real estate. Sanjay, a native of Kuchilakanta village under Mayurbhanj’s Betanati police station limits and a diploma holder in mig-aeronautic had started real estate trade in Sambalpur involving deceased and others, where deceased had invested more than Rs. 1.5 crores. When deceased wanted his money back, the prime accused decided to eliminate him from the scene and hatched a plan. The police arrested 7 accused persons including the mastermind Sanjay Ghose out of the total 9 killers involved in the incident. Police also seized the ‘axe’ used in the killing. Sanjay hired 4 criminals from Boudh district to executive his plan. Two were already arrested and identified as Prakash Nayak and Lankeswar Pradhan who confessed every thing before the police. The other accused persons identified as Sashikanta Senapati, Satyendra thankur, Padu @Pandab Rout and Rohit Pradhan of Sambalpur town were arrested by the police from Balasore and Mayurbhanj districts.  Accused Satyendra’s barber shop at Church chock of the town was the meeting place of the accused persons, police SP informed.    

 late Anup Babu

“Anup Babu had invested about Rs.1.5 crores in the real estate trade that was carried out by Sanjay Ghose, mortgaging his residential house located at Sahajog Nagar of Sambalpur and taking hand loan from friends. Accused Sashikanta Senapati was brain behind Sanjay. When Anup did not get any thing in return, he wanted his money back as the marriage of his two sisters was scheduled to be held in coming November.   He had also threatened Sanjay to drag him to police station to realize the money in case he did not get his money in time. So Sanjay hatched a plan to eliminate him by involving hired criminals”, SP (Sambalpur) Asheet Panigrahi said.

According to him, Sanjay had duped many people in the name of real estate and swindled crores of rupees but as there was no official record of transaction of money people remained silent over it. “Accused Sanjay was quite articulate in his talk and easily traps people to invest money in the real estate. But he always tries to take money in cash to avoid any further litigation,” SP added.  

Police investigation revealed that the accused informed the deceased on the morning of the 7^th October over phone that he wanted to back his money as he does not want to keep enmity with him and asked him to wait for his next call. In the evening he again called him over his cell phone and invited him to a secluded place near Sakhipara (behind the Jyoti Bhawan (missionary ladies hostel). When Anup Babu came with his scooty, on the way one of Sanjay’s aides Sashikanta Senapati sat behind the scooty to escort him to the spot.  “As per plan, every one including the 4 hire criminals were attacked him with axe as soon as Anup reached to the spot with out giving him a slightest moment to resist”, SP said. Sambalpur SP said that the accused persons had left a latter at the spot addressed to Anup where they mentioned his dispute regarding a contract work as the consequence of the incident. ‘but it was just to misguide us”, he said. He congratulated his subordinate officers for the achievement which was possible only because of the sincere and hard works of the these officers who include ASP Gopal Tripathy, Inspector Sanjiv Satpathy, inspector SK Mohapatra, and Sub-inspector Akash Sahu and Gopal Sahu.

Answering the question of media persons the SP revealed that the accused Sanjay was married to one lady identified as Elizabeth Ekka who presently works in AIR Sambalpur. The SP also admitted he has a keep working as lady police constable in Sambalpur. “We did not find their involvement in the incident, but our investigation is open and we will not spare any one found to be involved in the incident”, SP said.

He also appealed the people come forward to lodge complaint against the accused in case in case they have been duped by the accused in any given point of time. He has assured to keep secrecy of such complaint.