Guna police killings: One more held, count rises to five; two on the run

Guna (Madhya Pradesh): One more person has been arrested in connection with the last week's gunning down of three policemen by poachers in Madhya Pradesh's Guna district, taking the count of those arrested in the case so far to five, a senior official said on Saturday. Two accused are still on the run, he added.

"Irshad Khan, who was involved in the case and accompanied the accused while poaching, was arrested on Friday evening from Bajranggarh bypass," Guna's superintendent of police (SP) Rajiv Kumar Mishra said.

With this, three accused have so far been killed and five others arrested in connection with the killing of three policemen in the wee hours of May 14, he said.

The three policemen were killed after a group of poachers, most of them hailing from one family, opened fire on them near Saga Barkheda village, some 60 km from the district headquarters.

After the incident, a house-to-house search was conducted in Bidhoria village, which led to the discovery of the bullet-hit body of one of the accused, Naushad Khan (35), who was killed allegedly in retaliatory firing by the policemen.

The same day, another accused - Shahzad Khan (38), was killed in an encounter with the police personnel.

In an encounter on May 17, another accused - Chhotu Khan - was killed in the Ruthiyai area.

Apart from Irshad Khan, the four arrested accused were identified as Shanu alias Shafaq Khan (27), Mohammad Jiya Khan (28), Nisar Khan (70) and his son Shahraj Khan (52), police officials said.

Two others wanted in the case, identified as Gullu Khan (25) and Vicky aka Dilshad Khan (25), are still absconding, they said.

The poachers were hunting blackbuck for meat for a wedding function in Naushad Khan's family when a police team arrived at the spot after getting a tip-off about their presence, leading to the firing and the retaliatory action, the police have said.