Sonali Phogat murder: Fourth arrest is of a drug dealer, said police. (file)
New Delhi/Panaji:
In connection with the murder of actor and BJP leader Sonali Phogat, two more people have been arrested, including a drug dealer and owner of a Goa restaurant where she was seen partying the night before her death.
This takes the total number of arrests in the Haryana BJP leader’s death case to four. The arrest of Edwin Nunes, Curly’s restaurant owner and drug dealer Dattaprasad Gaonkar comes a day after two of his associates, Sudhir Sangwan and Sukhwinder Singh, were arrested.
Sangwan and Singh have admitted to the police that they had procured the drugs from Gaonkar, news agency PTI quoted an unnamed official as saying.
The police have so far questioned over 25 people in the case, including the restaurant staff, the resort where Phogat was staying, the hospital where she was declared brought dead, and her driver.
Police said yesterday, citing security camera footage and an alleged confession that Phogat was at the famous restaurant-cum-nightclub on Anjuna beach on Monday, where she was forcibly forced to drink “any unpleasant substance” mixed with water. was.
She “feeling restless” and could barely walk on her own after drinking it, and was taken away by her colleagues to the hotel, Grand Leoni, where they were staying. The BJP leader was taken to St. Anthony Hospital the next morning where he was declared brought dead.
“The investigating officer examined the CCTV recording of the premises concerned and found that Sudhir was forcing Sonali to drink the alleged liquid in a water bottle,” the police said in a statement.
Footage from a security camera that surfaced yesterday shows the former Bigg Boss contestant leaving the restaurant with Sangwan unable to walk.
Phogat’s death was initially seen as a case of a heart attack, but the Goa Police registered a murder case after his family demanded a full probe and intervention from Haryana Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar. Her family has also alleged rape but the police are yet to press those charges.
Police said Sangwan and Singh were arrested on Thursday evening so that they could not destroy evidence.
Phogat’s post-mortem report on Thursday revealed that “there were several blunt force marks on the body” and the police need to investigate the cause of his death. The police had said yesterday that the cause of his death would be known only after the viscera test.
The BJP leader’s brother Rinku Dhaka has alleged that his allies intended to capture his “property and financial assets” and “destroy his political career”.
Sonali Phogat, who was with the BJP since 2008, contested the 2019 Haryana Assembly elections but lost.