Top News

Accused in policeman’s murder caught after 28 years; he had shot the victim dead at a wedding ceremony—here is how the police nabbed him.

Samira Vishwas | August 7, 2026 1:24 AM CST

New Delhi: The Delhi Police Crime Branch has arrested an accused, who was absconding for 28 years in the murder case of a Haryana Police personnel and escape from police custody, from Ashok Nagar district in Madhya Pradesh, police said on Wednesday.

According to police, the accused has been identified as 53-year-old Rajendra Bairagi alias Rajendra Singh Yadav alias ‘Doctor Jhatka’, who was declared a fugitive by a Rohini court in 2008. Police said the accused has eight cases registered against him in Delhi, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh, including murder, attempt to murder and under the Arms Act.

A senior police officer said the accused was involved in a shootout that broke out after a brawl at a wedding ceremony in Saiyan Kheda village in Sonipat on May 10, 1998. He said the bride’s uncle and Haryana Police officer, Jai Bhagwan, was killed and another person was seriously injured in the incident.

Police said the accused was arrested in 1998 but escaped from the custody of Uttar Pradesh Police while being taken from Ghaziabad jail to a court in Sonipat on February 14, 1999, while in handcuffs.

According to the police, after escaping from custody, the accused worked as a physical education teacher in Kendriya Vidyalaya in Colaba, Maharashtra for a year and after that he settled in Mungaoli in Ashok Nagar district in Madhya Pradesh and changed his name to ‘Rajendra Singh Yadav’.

The accused married in 2003 and obtained local identity cards, including an Aadhaar card, a driver’s license, and a PAN card, using forged documents, the official said. He was working as an unauthorized doctor and property dealer in Mungaoli, he said.

Police said the accused was arrested in Mungaoli after an operation based on digital surveillance and intelligence. According to the officer, the accused revealed during interrogation that he was a kabaddi player and that while playing kabaddi, he came in contact with people with criminal tendencies and became involved in criminal activities. Police said his wife works as an assistant nurse at a government hospital in Madhya Pradesh, and they have two children, aged 17 and 16.