Pale Ram Chauhan

A poster by Change.org

 He was a Noida resident and was working to expose Sand Mafia. Gunned down at his home in Sec126, on July31, 2013.

TOI Report:

Pale Ram Chauhan

NOIDA: A day after a 50-year old crusader against illegal sand dredging was alleged shot dead by members of sand mining mafia, police have arrested three of the main accused for the murder. Even as other accused remain at large, the family of the victim has demanded a CBI probe into the case. They alleged that the administration was responsible for the victim, Pale Ram Chauhan's death, as repeated complaints against the illegal sand mining in their village had been ignored.

According to the police, the main accused in the murder case were rounded up from the Okhla area on Thursday evening. Police said they were attempting to flee to Delhi and then Haryana, when they were caught. The arrested have been identified as Rajpal and his two sons, Sonu and Kuldeep. Police have now launched an intensive manhunt to apprehend the other culprits involved in the crime. Preetinder Singh, Senior Superintendent of Police, Gautam Budh Nagar said they had formed teams to look out for the accused. "We have launched a rigorous pursuit and should round up the other accused soon," Singh said. Police further maintained that the murder had taken place due to a land dispute, which had been carrying on for several years.

However, the family of the victim continued to claim that the murder was because of Pale Ram's opposition to sand mining activities in the area. They said had been reporting about the illegal activities since the year 2004. "We have not only filed written complaints to the district administration but have also sought judicial help," said Ravindra Chauhan, Pale Ram's younger son. Showing TOI newspaper clippings dating back to 2004, Ravindra lamented that if officials had listened to them, their father would still be alive.

Denying the family's claims about inaction by the administration, police officials said that several offenders had been arrested in the complaints received from the villagers of Raipur.

A visit to the garm sabha land, where the victim and other villagers sowed their crops revealed huge craters dug several feet deep by the mining mafia. Allegedly the suspects for the murder of Pale Ram the family of the deceased has named in their complaint to the police, used to not only dredge sand from their fields but also from surrounding fields in the vicinity. "My father often objected to their dumpers trespassing through our fields. But they refused to stop. Instead they constantly threatened that they would kill us if we objected to their activity," Ravindra said. "A few days back, my neighbour's mobile phone was broken by the miscreants as he had tried to film their activities on his smart phone. He was also threatened," Ravindra said.

Pale Ram Chauhan was killed on Wednesday by three armed and masked men on a motorcycle when they barged into his house in broad daylight. They fired repeatedly at him at close range and Chauhan was hit by five bullets. The bullets hit him in the head, chest, face and hand and he succumbed to his injuries on the spot. The family of the Pale Ram, who was opposing the illegal sand mining activity, said that the sand mining mafia had shot him in an attempt to create fear in anyone out to stand up against them. They also said that the mafia had become bolder in the wake of the SDM, Durga Shakti Nagpal's suspension as she had created fear in them.