Kolhapur: The Sangli police have arrested Nilesh Vithoba Gadade, the primary suspect in the murder of Vedant Bandgar (14), son of Sangli APMC director Maruti Bandgar, at the latter's residence on the evening of June 11.
“On Monday, we produced Gadade before a local court which ordered his remand in police custody till June 18,” said inspector Sanjeev Zade of the Sangli local crime branch.
On June 12, the Sangli police had arrested one of the five suspects, Atul Vaydande, named in the crime, but Gadade and three others remained at large. “We arrested Gadade from a lodge located on the Maharashtra-Karnataka border, along with his woman friend,” a Sangli police officer said.
Gadade, who was out on bail granted by the Supreme Court in a July 2020 murder case, and his four aides had reached Bandgar’s house looking for Vedant’s grandfather, Balasaheb, who is the leader of a head loaders’ (mathadi workers) organisation.
Police said Gadade wanted to confront Balasaheb over an extortion and criminal intimidation case registered against him by a mathadi contractor after Balasaheb led a group of workers to the Jat police station. Balasaheb was away from home, and the five men instead shot dead Vedant from close range before fleeing the spot, police added.
“We sought custody of Gadade to recover the firearm used in the murder. Also, the other three suspects are still on the run and we need to question Gadade, who, according to eyewitnesses, pulled the trigger which led to the death of the 14-year-old boy,” a senior police official said on condition of anonymity.
On June 10, Gadade and his two aides visited mathadi contractor Laxman Kharat’s house near Jat to demand extortion as the latter had bagged a head loading contract at the railway goods yard at Arag in Miraj tehsil, and threatened Kharat’s wife as he was away from home. The following afternoon, Balasaheb, in his capacity as mathadi workers’ leader, Kharat and others visited the Jat police station and got the police to register a criminal complaint against Gadade.
According to police, all five suspects have criminal backgrounds. Two of them are life convicts in a murder case but are also out on bail.
Meanwhile, Jat police station in-charge inspector Sandip Kolekar has been transferred to Sangli police control room by Sangli SP Tushar Doshi.
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