Case against Vilash Shinde’s killers is watertight, say police

Shinde’s last rites were performed in his hometown of Shirgaon in Wai taluka, Satara district, at 10.45 am on Thursday

The Khar police on Thursday said they have a watertight case against the two brothers who allegedly murdered head traffic constable Vilas Shinde, 51, at a petrol pump in Khar on August 23.

Policewomen pay tribute to the late head constable Vilas Shinde at BDD chawl, Worli, on Thursday.(HT)

Shinde’s last rites were performed in his hometown of Shirgaon in Wai taluka, Satara district, at 10.45 am on Thursday. “He was given full state honours,” said deputy commissioner of police Ashok Dudhe.

Senior police inspector Ramchandra Jadhav of Khar police station said, “We have recovered the weapon, a wooden stick, used to commit the crime.” The police said while there is no CCTV footage of the attack on Shinde, a source confirmed that there are several eyewitnesses. The Khar police have recorded the statements of four of them – three employees of the petrol pump and a rickshaw driver.

The police have also seized the mobile phone of the younger brother, aged 16, and will using technical data to establish that he and his elder brother were at the scene of the crime – a petrol pump near Hotel Rajasthan on SV Road – at 3.15pm on August 23, when Shinde was attacked.

Nine days after he was assaulted, Shinde died in the intensive care unit of Lilavati Hospital at 1.45 pm on Wednesday. He died of injuries to the back of his head, where the elder brother, Ahmed Mohammad Ali Qureshi, allegedly hit him with the stick.

On the afternoon of August 23, Shinde was collecting details of motorists as part of a future e-challan system when he saw a minor riding a bike and stopped him. He asked the boy to call his parents as he was not legally allowed to ride a bike, the police said.

The boy telephoned his elder brother and told him an exaggerated version the incident. This enraged the 21-year-old Qureshi, who rushed to the spot and hit Shinde on the back of his head with a stick, according to the police. Qureshi was arrested from Belapur the next day. He was remanded in police custody and then in judicial custody.

He is currently in Arthur Road jail while his 16-year-old brother in a correction home at Dongri.