Lucknow : Three men have been arrested and two maulanas( Muslim clerics) were questioned and detained in connection with the murder of Hindu outfit leader Kamlesh Tiwari, UP’s director general of police OP Singh said on Saturday.

DGP OP Singh said the murder of 52-year-old Kamlesh Tiwari, the founder of the Hindu Samaj Party, was a fallout of “communal hate”.

The arrests have come less than 24 hours of the murder of Kamlesh Tiwari by two unidentified men in Lucknow’s Khursheed Bagh on Friday afternoon.

The Gujarat Anti Terrorism Squad (ATS) arrested three persons from Limbayat area of Surat, who according to the police were involved in planning Kamlesh Tiwari’s murder. The accused have been identified as – Maulana Mohsin Sheikh, Faizan and Khurshid Ahmed Pathan.

“UP police traced the conspirators through the bill of sweets purchased from a sweet shop in Surat with the help of Gujarat’s anti-terror squad,” Singh said while talking to reporters in Lucknow.

Singh said Maulana Sheikh Salim radicalised the other four men by showing a video of Kamlesh Tiwari’s hate speech against Muslims in 2015.
Rashid hatched the murder plan while Faizan was the person who purchased sweets from the Surat shop, according to Singh. Faizan was spotted on footage from the CCTV of the sweet shop, he added.

The same box was used by the two executors to carry weapons to commit Kamlesh Tiwari’s killing.

A pistol, which was recovered from the crime spot, and a knife used to slit the victim’s throat were in the same box, suggested the police probe.

Two executors, whose names have not been revealed yet, live in Surat but have links in Uttar Pradesh.

Meanwhile, the Lucknow police are expected to arrive in Surat on Saturday. The three accused arrested by Gujarat ATS will thereafter be handed over to the Lucknow police team.

Kiran Tiwari, wife of Kamlesh Tiwari, had said in her complaint to the police that Mohammad Mufti Naem Kazmi and Imam Maulana Anuvarul Haq were involved in her husband’s murder.
These clerics had announced a bounty of Rs 51 lakh for beheading Kamlesh Tiwari after his hate speech in 2015.

The DGP ruled out any terror link to the murder.

On Friday, Kamlesh Tiwari was murdered in a broad daylight at his office, located on the first floor of his house in Khurshidbagh area of Naka Hindola in Uttar Pradesh’s Lucknow.