New Delhi: Last week, the police in Uttar Pradesh’s Aligarh arrested Ashok Pandey, the spokesman of the Akhil Bhartiya Hindu Mahasabha (ABHM) in connection with the murder of a bike showroom owner in Hathras.
His wife Pooja Shakun Pandey, the general secretary of the ABHM and a mahamandleshwar of the Niranjani Akhara is the main accused in the case. She is now on the run.
On September 26, the victim Abhishek Gupta, his father Neeraj Gupta, and his cousin Jeetu Gupta had shut the showroom at the usual time in the evening, says the FIR, a copy which has been accessed by The Wire. They were waiting for a bus at an intersection. The father and cousin got into the bus but Abhishek was stopped by two men on a bike. They fired at him and fled the scene. He was fatally wounded in the head and instantly died on the spot. SHO Gandhinagar, Vijay told The Wire that the shooters have been traced. He said that the shooters were in touch with the accused. “Pooja Shakun’s location is being traced and she will soon be under arrest,” he said.
Abhishek Gupta. Photo: Facebook
Now, one of the two alleged shooters, a welder named Fazal, has been arrested by the police. He had reportedly worked on a tin shed in Pooja Shakun’s goshala.
The other shooter is still absconding. Per police investigation, Pandey and her husband called the shooter 39 times between August and September.
When asked about allegations that the complicated relationship between Pooja Shakun and the victim was being seen as the possible reason for the murder, the police officer said that it’s an allegation by the victim’s family and that all angles are being looked into.
Who is Pooja Shakun Pandey?
Pooja Shakun Pandey aka Sadhvi Annapurna aka Lady Godse is a prominent leader of the Hindu Mahasabha in Aligarh and is often in headlines for hate speech targeting minorities.She has made a name for herself with her violent speeches and campaigns for “protecting Hindus” from what she says is an imminent threat from the Muslims.
In 2021, she made headlines for her comments against Modi after he announced that the Union government will repeal the three farm laws in the wake of a year-long protest by the farmers at the borders of Delhi. Pooja Shakun had Modi’s portrait from the Aligarh office of the Hindu Mahasabha removed, saying “Jiski ek baat nahi, uska ek baap nahi.”
In a viral image, Pooja Shakun Pandey was seen shooting Mahatma Gandhi’s effigy. Photo: Facebook
In April 2020, a criminal case was filed against Pooja Shakun for promoting enmity between different groups on religious grounds and issuing a statement conducive to public mischief after a video in which she purportedly made provocative comments against Tablighi Jamaat members went viral. Later, she was briefly arrested.
At the infamous Dharam Sansad in Hardwar in 2021 where open calls for a Muslim genocide were made, Pooja Shakun, also gave a call to arms and incitement to genocide.
Without any ambiguity, she gave a direct call for the mass murder of Muslims.
“Nothing is possible without weapons. If you want to eliminate their population then kill them. Be ready to kill and be ready to go to jail. Even if 100 of us are ready to kill 20 lakhs of them [Muslims], then we will be victorious, and go to jail… Like [Nathuram] Godse, I am ready to be maligned, but I will pick up arms to defend my Hindutva from every demon who is a threat to my religion,” she said.
Despite her open call to murder Muslims on multiple occasions, Pooja Shakun had barely faced any legal consequences.
A story of radicalisation
Abhishek first came into touch with Pooja Shakun when he was barely 17. His father Neeraj Gupta had trusted her to be his son’s caretaker but soon things turned sour when Pooja Shakun allegedly took a loan of Rs 5 lakh from the family.
When Neeraj confronted Pooja Shakun to return the money, he was allegedly told to pay even more as she apparently told them that their son was in trouble with some girl. After allegedly paying over Rs 8 lakh, the family was already wary of Pooja Shakun.
The breaking point came when their son was arrested in 2019 after he featured in a video in which Pooja Shakun shot at an effigy of Mahatma Gandhi and raised slogans in support of his assassin, Nathuram Godse. She later set the effigy on fire. While the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) had dismissed its association with Pooja Shakun, she regularly interacts with leaders of the party like former BJP MP Sadhvi Pragya and has photos with former Madhya Pradesh chief minister Shivraj Singh Chauhan. In May 2019, Pooja Shakun was at the center of another controversy when she distributed knives to minor girls on Savarkar Jayanti.
After Abhishek was jailed in connection with shooting Gandhi’s effigy, his mother wanted to bring him back and she succeeded partially. But soon Abhishek returned to Pooja Shakun’s’s home, his brother Ashish told The Wire. “For the past two years, we had a hint of the affair between my brother and Pooja Shakun. My mother always wanted to bring him back, especially after the Gandhi effigy incident.”
“However,” Ashish added, “in recent months, my brother had begun to maintain distance, avoiding her calls. He took up a job and last Diwali he even gave Rs 3.5 lakh at home. She would constantly video call him to check his location.”
But as Abhishek began to maintain distance from Pooja Shakun, slowly strange things began to happen. “She was constantly trying to harm him. He was assaulted by goons and then there were attempts to implicate him in a false case,” said Ashish.
‘Nobody will look at such people if they stop targeting Muslims’
Pooja Shakun allegedly wanted a share in the bike showroom’s ownership. “She knew that by doing so she could still remain in touch with him.”
Ashish told The Wire that Abhishek would hide his money before meeting her. “At night, she would force him to sleep with her,” he alleged. But for sometime Abhishek had begun to avoid Pooja Shakun and stopped taking any calls.
“My brother was killed because of lust and greed,” he alleged. When asked about the various campaigns Pooja Shakun spearheaded, Ashish alleged that she privately confessed that she did that to get limelight and “TRP.”
“Nobody will look at such people if they stop targeting Muslims. Muslims contribute to our work. They work as mechanics and technicians. Three of our mechanics are Muslims. They [Muslims] never caused us any harm. She killed our brother.”