Haldiram owner, four others convicted

Owner of confectionery chain Halidram Bhujiawala and four others were today convicted by a city court for conspiring and attempting to murder a tea stall owner.

Prabhu Shankar Agarwal, owner of the multi-crore confectionery chain, was convicted by Tapan Sen, judge of fourth fast track court at Bankshall here along with history-sheeters Gopal Tiwari, Arun Khandelwal, Manoj Sharma and Raju Sonkar.

Agarwal and others were found guilty of conspiring to murder Pramod Sharma, nephew of the tea stall owner Satyanarayan Sharma on March 30, 2005.

The quantum of punishment will be pronounced on January 29.

Agarwal had faced obstruction in the construction of a huge food plaza at Burrabazar as the entrance was blocked by a tea stall owned by Satyanarayan, who was running it for the last 50 years.

 

Agarwal, who had got other tenants to vacate the premises on Jugmohan Mallick Lane, could not make the tea stall owner to move out.

The prosecution had stated that Satyanarayan had been threatened by the accused a few days before the attack.

In the early morning of March 30, Tiwari and his henchmen raided the shop and fired seriously injuring Pramod Sharma.

Agarwal, who was in London to open his first overseas food plaza at the time of the attack, was arrested when he returned home two months later.

Agarwal was arrested at IGI Airport as soon as he landed and was handed over to the Kolkata Police.

The other accused persons were also arrested. All of the them, were however, released on bail later.

The prosecution, during trial, submitted that Tiwari and his henchmen had embarked on the murder bid at the behest of Agarwal.

While Agarwal was convicted under sections 307 (attempt to murder) and 120B (conspiracy), the other four were found also found guilty under the Arms Act.