Zubeen death: Fest organiser, manager held; sent to 14-day custody

GUWAHATI: Two fugitive prime accused in the probe into Zubeen Garg’s death were arrested before dawn on Wednesday and sent to police custody for 14 days, while the music icon’s 13th-day mourning rituals drew massive crowds in Jorhat, with fans crying for justice.

North East India Festival organiser Shyamkanu Mahanta was detained by immigration officers at New Delhi airport around 12.30am after arriving from Singapore on the basis of an Interpol lookout notice, officials said, and handed to Assam police . An hour later, Garg’s manager Siddharth Sharma was caught near the Delhi-Haryana border in Gurgaon.

Zubeen’s aides booked for culpable homicide not amounting to murder
Both were flown to Guwahati, produced before the chief judicial magistrate at the judge’s residence due to Durga Puja court closures, and remanded in police custody for 14 days.

Security was tightened at Guwahati airport, along the convoy route, and at the magistrate’s residence, with Assam police and RAF personnel deployed. Photographs released by police showed Mahanta and Sharma in handcuffs inside a police van. DGP Harmeet Singh said: “The investigation is progressing well.”

Assam police’s SIT has charged the duo with conspiracy, culpable homicide not amounting to murder, and causing death by negligence. “Interrogation has started and we are going to do everything as per law,” said Munna Prasad Gupta, special DGP (CID) heading the nine-member SIT. He said investigators had seized the two men’s mobile phones along with Garg’s own handset, which was with his manager.

Over 60 FIRs have been filed demanding a full probe, 55 of them naming four men: Mahanta; manager Sharma, an employee of a Mumbai-based talent management firm; drummer Shekharjyoti Goswami, and businessman Sanjive Narain.

SIT has interrogated Goswami, the singer’s cousin and police officer Sandipon Garg, actress Nishita Goswami, and singer-actress Amritprabha, all of whom were in Singapore at the time. Interpol lookout notices were earlier circulated for Mahanta and Sharma after they ignored SIT summons to appear before Oct 6.

Garg’s widow Garima Saikia Garg said in Jorhat she was relieved the duo had been brought to Assam. “We are all waiting to know what happened to him in his last moments,” she said. In her FIR, she alleged Mahanta failed to provide security, medical support, or proper accommodation for Garg in Singapore.