Who was Divya Pahuja, ex-girlfriend of Gurugram's most-wanted gangster, shot dead in hotel room?

In a shocking turn of events, Divya Pahuja, a former model and ex-girlfriend of Haryana’s most-wanted gangster Sandeep Gadoli, has been murdered by a hotel owner and his associates in Gurugram, police said. The gruesome incident unfolded this New Year’s Day, over five months after she was released on bail in connection with the alleged fake encounter of Gadoli in Mumbai in 2016. The murder has raised suspicions of involvement by Gadoli’s aides. Let’s take a closer look. Who was Divya Pahuja? Resident of Gurugram’s Baldev Nagar, Divya Pahuja, 27, was a former model and one of the accused in the alleged fake encounter of her then-boyfriend and gangster Sandeep Gadoli. Pahuja was 18 when arrested by the Mumbai police on 14 July 2016. According to PTI, police had said that the 27-year-old model was used as a honey trap to lure Gadoli in at a Mumbai hotel near Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj International Airport, where he was later killed in a fake encounter with the police. The police claimed that she shared information about his whereabouts through her mother Sonia (also arrested in the case) with his rival Virendra Kumar, aka Binder Gujjar, and the Haryana police, leading to his killing on 6 February 2016, as per Hindustan Times. Pahuja filed an application for a plea in January 2023, saying that she was willing to take the blame for informing the police about Gadoli “in order to save her family as he had threatened to kidnap her father and then minor sister.” According to Indian Express, she retracted the plea a few days later, claiming that her mental state had influenced her and that she had filed it under pressure. She also claimed that the six-year jail sentence had affected her. Her bail pleas were denied five times before the Bombay High Court finally granted it in June 2023, citing the fact that she had already served six years in prison and that the trial would take some time to finish. The report stated Pahuja and other prisoners, among them former media executive Indrani Mukerjea, staged a protest in 2017 to call for the punishment of prison officials for allegedly assaulting an inmate who subsequently passed away. She also reported in 2018 that she had been assaulted by prison guards, but in 2022, she was confronted with accusations of bullying and running a prison gang from another inmate. The murder On Tuesday night, five people took Divya Pahuja to a hotel in Gurugram and shot her in the head. The three arrested aides have been identified as Abhijeet Singh, a 56-year-old resident of Hisar’s Model Town; Omprakash, 23-year-old from West Bengal’s Jalpaiguri; and Hemraj, 28, from Nepal, reported Times Now. Pahuja’s death came to light when her sister Naina went to the police, believing there had been foul play after her family was unable to get in touch with her. She reported to the officials that her sister had last been seen at a hotel in the city that was owned by 56-year-old Abhijeet Singh.

#WATCH | Haryana: Outside visuals of the Gurugram hotel where former model Divya Pahuja was allegedly murdered. pic.twitter.com/s9lbJ4cOux

— ANI (@ANI) January 4, 2024

Bloodstains on the stairs were discovered by police when they arrived at the hotel late on Tuesday night. When the team looked through the CCTV, they saw two men dragging a body covered in a bedsheet down a corridor and loading it into a blue BMW. “When the police scanned the CCTV footage of the hotel, the crime was revealed. The matter has been documented, and an investigation is underway. The crime team is also looking into the matter,” Superintendent of Police Mukesh Kumar told PTI.

Three accused including the main accused were arrested on January 3. The accused have been identified as Abhijeet Singh (56), Hemraj (28) and Omprakash (23). A case was registered under relevant sections in Police Station Sector-14, Gurugram: Gurugram Police pic.twitter.com/d2jEHIuKoU

— ANI (@ANI) January 4, 2024

More from Explainers

This Week in Explainers: How recovering from Gen-Z protests is a Himalayan task for Nepal How Tanzania’s ‘hero rats’ are saving lives by sniffing out landmines, tuberculosis

According to an official, Singh allegedly paid the two guys ₹ 10 lakh to conceal the body in his BMW and deposit it in an unrecoverable location, as per NDTV. The body has not yet been located by the police. Singh says he disposed of Pahuja’s body in the Punjab and Haryana border region, reported by Times Now. Singh admitted that Pahuja had been demanding money from him during the initial interrogation. He said that even after collecting a substantial amount, she refused to delete compromising pictures. He shot her dead in Hotel City Point apparently out of rage. “Singh revealed that on Tuesday night, he met her at a room in his hotel and tried deleting the photographs from her phone, but could not unlock the phone as it was password protected. This led to a heated argument, and Singh shot her dead,” Hindustan Times quoted ACP Kumar as saying. Further investigation is ongoing, and the case will be presented in court for appropriate legal proceedings.