A 35-year-old man, currently out on bail in an extortion case, was riddled with five bullets by armed assailants outside a roadside eatery in Ghaziabad’s Modinagar on Thursday.
A 35-year-old man, currently out on bail in an extortion case, was riddled with five bullets by armed assailants outside a roadside eatery in Ghaziabad’s Modinagar on Thursday. The victim, Rahul Chaudhary, a resident of Raj Nagar Extension, managed to drive his Scorpio for over 25 km to a hospital despite bleeding profusely. He underwent emergency surgery and remains in critical condition, police said.
According to Modinagar ACP Bhaskar Verma, police have secured a 49-second CCTV clip capturing the shooting near Swagat Dhaba in Seekri Kalan along NH-58. The footage shows two men waiting beside a scooter as Chaudhary arrived at around 9:30 pm. One of them is seen opening the driver-side door. Moments later, a third man, dressed in a black shirt and blue jeans, approaches the SUV and opens fire at close range while Chaudhary was still seated inside.
The gunman then calmly walked away after the shooting, while his accomplices fled on the scooter.
Even after suffering bullet wounds to his neck, chest, abdomen and leg, Chaudhary managed to drive for more than 30 minutes to Yashoda Hospital in Sanjay Nagar. Hospital staff told police that he entered through the main gate on his own, stepped out, called for help, and collapsed shortly after. He was immediately taken in for surgery and later shifted to the ICU.
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Preliminary probe suggests Chaudhary had gone to the dhaba to collect Rs 75,000 from two individuals he had been in contact with prior to the incident.
Chaudhary’s wife, Karishma, revealed that her husband had received calls from acquaintances Vinay Vashishth and Arvind Saini, who insisted on meeting him that evening. Initially, they asked him to visit Vashishth’s residence, but he declined due to the narrow approach road. The meeting was then shifted to Swagat Dhaba.
“After about 15 minutes of talking, when he was about to leave, Saini opened the car door and asked, ‘Bhaiya, when will you come again?’ Just then, Vashishth, Saini and Ashwani Chauhan, along with some unknown person, opened fire at him,” Karishma said.
She further alleged a larger conspiracy behind the attack, naming Jalbeer Pandit, Ravi Valmiki and Peetam Saini as key orchestrators. According to her, Pandit is a history-sheeter with over two dozen criminal cases and had previously plotted a similar attack on her husband. Despite a case registered at Niwari police station, Pandit remains absconding.
Police records paint a complex picture of Chaudhary himself, who has been named in 18 criminal cases—including murder, attempted murder, and extortion—across multiple police stations in Ghaziabad. While he has been acquitted in seven cases, he was arrested six months ago in an extortion case and had secured bail just two months before the shooting.
Acting on Karishma’s complaint, police have registered an FIR under BNS sections 109 (attempt to murder) and 61(2) (criminal conspiracy) against the named accused and two unidentified individuals.
Police have formed five dedicated teams to track down the suspects. They are also combing through CCTV footage from nearby areas to identify the shooter and piece together the full chain of events, ACP Verma added.