Kannur: A PFI worker has been nabbed from the Karnataka-Maharashtra border for the January 19 murder of Akhila Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad (ABVP) activist Shyama Prasad. V M Saleem, who has been working at a hotel in the area since vanishing after the murder, is the president of the Uruvachal unit of the Popular Front of India (PFI).
Saleem, an accused in the case, is suspected to be the brain behind the plot to murder Shyama Prasad, a resident of Kannavam. He was arrested by the Peravur police.
A masked gang which arrived in a car had hacked the ABVP worker, who was riding a bike at Kannavam, around 5 pm on the fateful day. Eyewitnesses claimed his friend was on the pillion as they proceeded on the Thalassery-Nedumpoyil road and the gang brought them down with the car in which they had arrived. Shyama Prasad ran towards a nearby house through an alley, but he couldn't enter as it was locked. The assailants, who were following him, hacked him on the verandah of the house. Meanwhile, his friend had fled.
The eyewitnesses said the car's number plate was also masked. The armed gang threatened workers who rushed to help Shyama Prasad hearing his wails. As more people gathered, they fled in the car.
The victim was rushed to the government hospital at Koothuparamba, but he died on the way.
Five PFI workers had been arrested in the case earlier, four of them by the Thalappuzha police in Wayanad district on the day of the murder itself.
Shyama Prasad was the chief instructor (mukhya sikshak) at the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh unit at Pathinezham Mile at Kannavam and was a student of the Government ITI at Kakkayangad.
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