The Dakshina Kannada police has arrested two persons each in connection with the murders of Basheer and Deepak Rao that rocked the district earlier this month.
Deepak Rao, a BJP worker, was hacked to death at Katipalla on January 3 triggering tension and violence in the district. Basheer was waylaid and assaulted in Mangaluru on the same night and succumbed to injuries at a hospital on January 7.
A special police team investigating the murder of Rao arrested two more persons – Abdul Aziz (42) and Abdul Azim (34) – on the charge of aiding the accused in the crime while Lateesh (24) and Pushparaj (23) from neighbouring Kasargod district in Kerala were arrested in connection with Basheer’s murder.
The police had already arrested four persons in connection with each incident taking the total number of arrests to six. The police said that the four people arrested wanted to take revenge for Deepak's death.
"In fact, they were familiar with Basheer's movements as they frequented to his eatery. On their way from Garodi temple (near Nagori) to Surathkal, they spotted him at Kottara Chowki and assaulted him nearly 15 times, the video grab showed," Mangaluru Police Commissioner TR Suresh had earlier told the media.
“They said that they just wanted to attack someone from the community. They were travelling to Surathkal and saw Basheer, so they attacked him. They knew Kottara Chowki, where the eatery was located, and also knew that Basheer would be an easy target. They have not yet revealed the name of the organisation they belong to, but they have said that they are pro-Hindu activists,” Commissioner Suresh added.
Dakshina Kannada has seen a number of communal flare-ups in the last few months resulting in the deaths of both Hindus and Muslims. It has also led to a political slugfest with the BJP claiming that 21 Hindu activists have been killed under the current Congress regime.
Karnataka is set to go to polls later this year in May.