Tamil Nadu - Chennai

Arrested for murder conspiracy

CHENNAI: An industrialist, D. Das alias Panneerdas (36) of Velachery, has been arrested on charges of conspiring the murder of R. Purushottaman (35) of Guindy here on October 22. According to police, Purushottaman was waylaid by a two-member gang that came in a car and hacked to death on the Eldams Road in Teynampet. The victim was going home on a motorcycle when the incident took place. His business partner, Venkatesan (38), who was following him on another motorcycle, lodged a complaint with the police.

Under the instructions from the Commissioner of Police, K. Radhakrishnan, the Mylapore Deputy Commissioner of Police, A.G. Mourya, formed a special team to expedite investigation in the case. Following a tip-off, the team made enquiries about Panneerdas who was a long-time friend of Purushottaman. It came to light that both were friends at college who had planned to make it big in business. Since an agreement on a joint venture could not be achieved, they established roti-making gadget unit in Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh individually. Later, Purushottaman launched the units to compete with Panneerdas.

Investigations revealed that Panneerdas was under the impression that his former friend was trying to eliminate him from the industry. He conspired with S. Periasamy (27) of Velachery and U. Udayakumar (29) of Nattarasankottai (Sivaganga district) to murder Purushottaman.

After monitoring the movements of Purushottaman for sometime, Periasamy and Udayakumar decided to kill him on October 22. They came in a car, committed the murder and escaped from the scene.

The team arrested the three suspects who were produced in a city court and remanded to judicial custody.

The main accused, Panneerdas, received the Rajiv Gandhi award for young industrialist from the Haryana Governor in August and the Indira Gandhi award from the Bihar Governor in November, police added.

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