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Updated: Oct 24, 2019 05:02 IST

Days after the family of Kamlesh Tiwari, the murdered Hindu Samaj Party chief, met him, UP chief minister Yogi Adityanath on Wednesday sanctioned an immediate financial help of Rs 15 lakh to his wife.

A senior state government official said the chief minister also sanctioned a house for the family in tehsil Mehmoodabad in Sitapur district. Adityanath directed officials that those arrested should be tried in a fast track court.

Tiwari’s mother Kusum, who had accused a BJP leader of having a hand in his murder, said she was “satisfied” with the government. Demanding “nothing short of a death penalty” for her son’s killers, she said she felt indebted to the government (for quickly working out the case).

“I am happy with Gujarat ATS, UP police and the government,” she said on the phone from Sitapur. The body of Tiwari, who was killed last week, had 15 stab wounds and a bullet injury below his chin, according to the post-mortem report.

Tiwari, 45, was shot once on his face and the bullet got stuck below his chin. He also had multiple injuries on his face and neck, according to the autopsy report.

Fifteen cut and stab wounds were found on Tiwari’s body, a police officer said on Wednesday. According to experts, it appears that the assailants first opened fire on Tiwari. When they tried to fire again, the bullet got stuck in the pistol so they attacked him with a knife and some pointed weapon.

The former Hindu Mahasabha leader who ran his own outfit, Hindu Samaj Party, was found dead at his residence in Naka Hindola area of Lucknow last Friday. The post-mortem report says two knife stab wounds were found on right side of the chest, seven stab wounds by some pointed object were found on left side of chest, cut wound below the chin, deep wound on neck, two wounds on left shoulder, back and right shoulder.

Police have recovered the pistol and knife allegedly used by suspects Ashfaq Sheikh (34) and Moinuddin Pathan (27), who were arrested by the Gujarat ATS on Tuesday evening.

An Ahmedabad court has granted an Uttar Pradesh Police team 72-hour transit remand of the two accused. A transit remand is granted when the accused is to be produced before a court in another city.

Meanwhile, online food delivery service Zomato has issued a statement that it has zero tolerance for anyone breaking the law. The statement followed public outrage after it came to light that one of the arrested men, Pathan, was a Zomato delivery boy till recently. A spokesperson of the online food delivery service said that Pathan had joined the company on August 17, 2019, in Surat after “a background check” including review of his Aadhaar card, driving license, PAN card, and past court records, by an independent agency. He made his last delivery on October 6, “post which he ceased to work on our platform of his own volition,” the spokesperson said. Sheikh and Pathan were arrested from the Gujarat-Rajasthan border on Tuesday.

Earlier on Tuesday, the UP ATS had detained three persons, including Bareilly-based cleric Maulana Kaifi Ali, for allegedly helping the two killers. UP ATS officials said the two visited Ali after they killed Tiwari.

The police also questioned the driver (Tauhid Ahmed) and owner (Rajkumar) of the taxi the killers are believed to have hired on October 19 in their bid to cross over to Nepal from Shahjanpur. A senior ATS officer said the three were taken into custody and taken to Lucknow for questioning. ATS officials said Ali facilitated the treatment of Pathan who suffered injuries to his right hand while attacking Tiwari with a knife. Following this, they returned to Lakhimpur Kheri with a plan to sneak into Nepal from the Gauri Fanta area on the India-Nepal border, the officer said, but returned after seeing heavy police presence.

In addition to Tuesday’s arrests, six people have been arrested in the case, three from Surat, two Bijnor residents and a Nagpur man.