Key suspect held in Avandhi spurious liquor case

NAGPUR, March 5: The local crime branch (LCB) of the rural police has arrested Vijay Nandurkar, one of the two key suspects in the Avandhi...

NAGPUR, March 5: The local crime branch (LCB) of the rural police has arrested Vijay Nandurkar, one of the two key suspects in the Avandhi liquor deaths case, who was himself admitted to a hospital for consuming the spurious liquor. An case of murder has been registered against him.

The hunt for the other suspect, Vinayak alias Vinod Bhaiyyalal Nimburkar is on, the police said and added that Vijay would be produced in the court tomorrow for seeking his remand in police custody. Initially, the police had registered an offence of negligence causing death and injury and against the

two suspects.

Vijay is reported to be the brain behind producing the Indosulfan-mixed country-made liquor that took toll of four people and left as many afflicted with poisoning.In association with Nimburkar, he offered the insecticide-mixed liquor to seven persons from the Avandhi village, 12 kms from Kamptee, last Thursday and Friday.

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The entire theory of a party arranged by one of the victims, Chudaman Patil, at his farm is believed to be concocted by Vijay to save his skin.

Police investigations revealed that it was a` maiden experiment’ by Vijay, of mixing deadly insecticide Indosulfan into country-made liquor to give more kick to his customers. However, his misadventure proved fatal.He reportedly offered the potent mixture to some of the hard-core drinkers from the village to check its efficacy. Chudaman, his brother Lalchand, Bandu Waghmare and Naththu Wasnik were killed in the incident.

According to reliable sources, Vijay, who used to supply country-made liquor to the villagers, decided to prepare a new product. Last Thursday, he procured liquor from Gumthala village and added Indosulfan to it. However, `by mistake’ an extra dose of Indosulfan got added to the liquor. As a result, the liquor lost its original colour and appeared a reddish mixture. To remove this colour, Vijay then added alum to it before offering it to customers.

Soon after, he took the liquor to his pan shop, where he offered it to the Patil brothers and two others. Each one of them consumed a glassful of this mixture and returned home. Vijay ensured that all of them returned home safe.The next day, all four suffered of poisoning and died even before reaching to the hospital.Perturbed by this development, he decided to try the mixture on some more people. He invited two more villagers, Vinayak Chandrabhan Patil and Madhukar Fajitrao Patil and offered them the same brew while himself consuming a peg alongwith them.All of them had to be hospitalised soon.

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Nimburkar, who fortunately escaped from this trial and error experiment escaped from the village and is yet to be arrested.

Senior police officials said that the autopsy on the bodies of the deceased has confirmed deaths due to poisoning, while a liquor can that was recovered from Nandurkar’s pan shop also smelt of the deadly insecticide.