Date:31/03/2008 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2008/03/31/stories/2008033157940100.htm

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“ASP’s missing revolver used to kill Rajbir”

Staff Reporter

NEW DELHI: The Gurgaon police on Sunday said “encounter specialist” Rajbir Singh was killed with the service revolver of the ASP (Hissar) that went missing after an encounter at Dadri last year.

At a press conference, Gurgaon Police Commissioner Mohinder Lal said the .32 firearm was the service revolver of ASP Ashok Seoran. During an encounter at Dadri in July 2007, the officer lost the weapon in a maize field while chasing a criminal. Mr. Seoran lodged an FIR at the area police station on July 21, 2007.

Mr. Seoran told a news channel that he lost his revolver in an encounter.

Earlier, when the police recovered the revolver at the instance of accused Vijay Bhardwaj after Rajbir’s murder, they found the manufacturing number “E-8256” etched on it.

Enquiries at the Kanpur ordnance factory revealed that a firearm of that serial number was issued to a resident of Jhajjar in Haryana in 2004.

When the police contacted the person, he produced the firearm bearing the same number.

The police found that the serial number of the revolver used in the murder of Rajbir was tampered with and that its real number was “A-1031.”

The revolver was issued by the Kanpur ordnance factory on February 26, 1993, and allotted to the ASP (Hissar).