Bounty on Vikas Dubey, wanted in killing of 8 policemen, increased to ₹5 lakh

Lucknow: The bounty on notorious criminal Vikas Dubey, who has been missing since Friday after allegedly killing eight policemen in Uttar Pradesh’s Kanpur, has been increased to Rs 5 lakh. It is the fourth time the reward has been increased for giving information about Dubey in the past six days.

At first, IG Kanpur Mohit Agarwal announced a reward of Rs 50,000 on his head, which was gradually increased to Rs 1 lakh by ADG Kanpur Zone JN Singh on Sunday and Rs 2.5 lakh by UP DGP HC Awasthy on Tuesday. The UP home department further recommended increasing the reward to Rs 5 lakh.

The Uttar Pradesh Special Task Force (STF) on Wednesday killed an aide of Dubey in Hamirpur and arrested another following an encounter in Kanpur for their alleged role in last week’s Bikru ambush that led to killing of eight policemen, who had gone to arrest the gangster.

“Amar Dubey, who carried a reward of Rs 25,000, was killed in an encounter in Maudaha village in Hamirpur district,” STF IG Amitabh Yash told PTI.

In a separate encounter, hours after Amar Dubey was gunned down, Shyamu Bajpai, another associate of Vikas Dubey, was arrested in Chaubeypur area of Kanpur.

According to sources, Amar Dubey was involved in the security of Vikas Dubey and travelled with him wherever he went while Bajpai too was close to the gangster.

About the delay in the arrest of Vikas Dubey, the IG said, “He is a hardened criminal and was used to hiding so it is taking time but we will surely nab him. We have started getting success.”

Vikas Dubey’s close relative Shama, neighbour Suresh Verma and domestic help Rekha and her husband Dayashankar Agnihotri, a key member of Dubey’s gang, were arrested by police.

On Tuesday, all 68 personnel of the Chaubeypur Police Station were shunted to the reserve police lines amid doubts over their professional integrity. The announcement was made soon after police transferred Anand Deo, DIG STF, who till recently was the Senior Superintendent of Police in Kanpur. Deo was the Kanpur SSP in March when Deputy Superintendent of Police Devendra Mishra purportedly wrote a damning letter, which surfaced on the social media after he was killed in the Bikru ambush.

The unverified letter to the then Kanpur SSP alleged that Chaubeypur station officer Vinay Tiwari had watered down an FIR lodged against the gangster. It suggested that Tiwari and Dubey were close. However, police said there is no record of the purported letter, which is undated and carries no serial number. Deo also said that the signature on it does not match that of the slain officer. But police said they will still investigate the letter. Lucknow Range IG Lakshmi Singh is probing the matter.