Sachin Sawant, a former deputy shakha pramukh of the Shiv Sena was shot dead in Kurar’s Gokul Nagar area, Malad, on Sunday evening by unknown persons. (Photo: ANI/Twitter)

Mumbai: Sachin Sawant, a former deputy shakha pramukh of the Shiv Sena was shot dead in Kurar’s Gokul Nagar area, Malad, on Sunday evening by unknown persons.

The unidentified shooters shot three rounds at Sawant and then fled from the spot on a two-wheeler. Sawant was rushed to the nearest civic-run hospital in Malad, where he was declared dead on arrival.

The police has held one person for questioning. This is the third incident of a Sainik being shot dead.

Earlier, on April 7, two Sena leaders — Sanjay Kotkar (35) and Vasant Thube (40) — were shot and stabbed to death in the Kedgaon area of Ahmednagar, followed by the brutal murder of Sena worker, Shailesh Nimse from Bhiwandi taluka on Thursday.

Meanwhile, the initial probe into the murder of Nimse, who was set ablaze in Bhiwandi in a bid to prevent his identification, has revealed that there were two masked men seen escorting him to the location where his body was found on Friday morning.

The police have not identified the masked accused yet and will be questioning the family to check if he received any death threats or had animosity with somebody.

Shiv Sena's Shahapur sub-divisional head Shailesh Nimse had gone missing late on Thursday night from his residence after he stepped out of his house to attend a phone call. Hour’s later on Friday morning, his dead body was found in a partially burnt state at Devchola near Digha in Bhiwandi taluka.

According to the sources in Ganeshpuri police station, they have laid hands on the Closed Circuit Television (CCTV) footage of an area near Devchola, where two masked men were seen escorting Nimse from the seat adjacent to the driver. However the police did not obtain the footage of the exactly where he was found dead.

The police have initiated a lookout for the two unidentified accused.

The Ganeshpuri police have already registered a case against the unidentified persons under section 302 of the IPC.