Scribe killing: CBI files for case closure

Mystery over the killing of scribe of local Hindi daily at Bilashpur, nearly 120 km from here, when he was returning after his night shift on December 19, 2010, has remained unsolved with CBI filing its closure report in the case late on Monday. A year after Sushil Pathak, news editor of a leading vernacular daily of Chhattisgarh, was murdered; the state government handed over the case for investigation to CBI following the failure of the state crime branch to make any headway into it. The CBI, file its closure report filed before the CBI special court judge Ashwini Kumar Chaturvedi reportedly said no evidence could be established to link the three suspects in the incident. The court accepted the report and ordered release of the murder suspects, Ram Bahadur Nagar, Rajesh Thakkar and Badal Khan, lodged in Raipur Central jail here.

Incidentally, the CBI had earlier landed in an embarrassment when one of the investigators, assistant sub-inspector Laxmi Narayan Majhi was arrested on charges of demanding '8 lakh bribe from one of the three suspects in the murder.

Pathak was shot dead by unidentified assailants when he was returning home after completing his night shift job on the fateful day.