Three Arrested for Murder of Retired Highways Employee in Sultanpur; Police Inspector Dismissed

Three of them were arrested for killing retd highways personnel; police suspended

Lucknow: Two days after retired highways employee Surendra Pandey (62) was shot dead near Rajanpur village in Sultanpur’s Gosaiganj district, police on Wednesday arrested three people and sent them to jail.
Sultanpur SP Somen Barma also suspended Gosaiganj inspector in charge of Prem Chand Singh for laxity.
Surendra was returning home with vegetables when two assailants on bicycles blocked his way and shot him in the head over a long-standing land dispute. After the attack, the attackers fled the scene on their motorcycles. Barma said Kailash Nath Mishra, Aditya Nath Mishra and Badri Prasad Mishra were involved in the murder and added that there was an ongoing dispute in court between the suspects and the victim over a piece of land.
The victim also testified in court that he was threatened by the defendant and asked for a lawsuit to be filed against them. Barma said that despite knowing that the issue was sensitive and there was a land dispute, local police station officer Prem Chand Singh ignored it and did not initiate any preventive action, hence his suspension.
A day before his murder, Surendra had built a boundary wall around his property, leaving the disputed land untouched. The family suspected three suspects were involved in the murder.
The two families are involved in numerous civil and criminal cases regarding disputed land. Surendra was the second of five brothers and was survived by his wife, a daughter and a son.