PTI
BHOPAL
As a controversy raged over the police action after the daring pre-dawn jailbreak, TV channels showed footage purportedly from the encounter site in which a policeman is seen pumping bullets into a man from close range after some unidentified person takes out what appears to be a knife said to be in a plastic cover and places it back.
The activists of the banned Students Islamic Movement of India (SIMI), two of whom were involved in a similar jailbreak in Khandwa three years ago, managed to escape around 2-3 am after killing a jail security guard by scaling the prison wall with the help of bed sheets, DIG Bhopal Raman Singh said.
Acting on the leads provided by locals, the undertrials were tracked down to Malikheda where they were encircled and killed when they tried to challenge the police, a police official said.
All the eight were killed by Bhopal police at Malikheda , Home Minister Bhupendra Singh told PTI.
The eight activists were identified as Amzad, Zakir Hussain Sadiq, Mohammad Salik, Mujeeb Shaikh, Mehbood Guddu, Mohammad Kalid Ahmed, Aqeel and Majid, a police official said.
The National Investigation Agency will probe the jailbreak even as contradictions surfaced on the encounter.
The jail superintendent was among four officials suspended by the Madhya Pradesh government.
IG Yogesh Choudhary said the fleeing SIMI activists had weapons in their possession and opened fire when confronted and the police fired in retaliation, in comments that appeared to contradict the Home Minister’s statement.
Bhupendra Singh said the undertrials used spoons and plates they carried from the prison as weapons to attack the security personnel.
