IB Staffer Ankit Sharma’s Murder A Case Of ‘Targetted Killing’, Could Be A ‘Message’ By Killers: Report

The probe into the death of Intelligence Bureau (IB) Ankit Sharma during the recent violence in Delhi has indicated a strong possibility of it being a “targeted killing”, and not a random act of violence, as per a report in The Times of India.

As per the report, an investigator has indicated that ‘targeted killing’ is becoming the strongest line of probe .

"The fact that Sharma was abducted and taken away and not killed or harmed at the spot by the mob had raised suspicion at first. The theory has only been strengthened as the sequence of events has become clearer. Vengeance is clearly visible by the condition of the body. Nobody is killed like this usually by a mob," an unnamed investigator has been quoted as saying in the TOI report.

An unnamed source in the intelligence department also told the newspaper that “the sequence indicates that the killers may have been trying to send across a message”.

According to the report, the police found that Sharma had returned from office around 5 pm on 25 February, following which he stepped out with his friends.

Sharma, along with his friend Kalu and a few others, was on one side of a small bridge while heavy stone-pelting was on from the other side.

Sharma tripped over a stone and fell, after which three-four men came from the other side and overpowered Sharma. He was then dragged away to other side, says the Times report citing “officials”.

The men, according to an unnamed source quoted in the report, did not touch anyone but Sharma.

He was then possibly taken to a confined location as nobody saw him after. It was in the said confined location that he is suspected to have been stripped and brutalised.

Later, Sharma’s body was possibly dragged to the drain and dumped. The body, with only an undergarment on it, was recovered the next day from the drain.

The doctors who conducted post-mortem on Sharma’s body, told the cop present there that it had at least 54 deep stab wounds.