The main accused in the murder of journalist Gauri Lankesh, KT Naveen Kumar, has confessed to the killing, the Special Investigation Team (SIT) has reportedly claimed.

The main accused in the murder of journalist Gauri Lankesh, KT Naveen Kumar, has confessed to the killing, the Special Investigation Team (SIT) has reportedly claimed.

The police memo accessed by News18 states that Kumar recorded his statement, owning up to the murder. According to the confession statement, Kumar and his accomplice Praveen planned the murder outside Adi Chanchanagiri complex at Vijayanagara in the western part of Bengaluru.

Kumar took the police to both the crime spot and the place where he allegedly plotted her murder, the report added.

Police claim that Kumar has agreed to a lie detector test and he took them to crime spot using the same route he allegedly took on the night of murder, News18 added.

An officer of the SIT had earlier said that narcoanalysis test would be conducted on Kumar. "Though the court allowed us to conduct the narco test, or a lie-detector test, on KT Naveen Kumar on 12 March, the date and place for the same have not been fixed yet," SIT Investigation Officer MN Anucheth had told IANS.

Kumar was taken into custody on 3 March by the Karnataka SIT for questioning. He hails from Birur town in Chikkamagaluru district, about 250 kilometres west of Bengaluru, SIT Investigating Officer MN Anucheth said.

Lankesh, 55, the editor of Lankesh Patrike, was shot dead outside her residence in the city's southwestern suburb by unidentified assailants on 5 September last year.

The state government had set up the SIT to probe the journalist-activist's killing.

With inputs from agencies