Wanted criminal's brother shot dead near polling booth in Bihar's Purnia

PURNIA: The younger brother of jailed criminal Bittu Singh, wanted in more than a dozen murder and extortion cases, was shot dead on Saturday near a polling booth in the district when he was going to cast the ballot, police said. The 30-year-old Beni Singh was shot dead at Sarsi village in Dhamdaha assembly constituency by a bike-borne assailant, Superintendent of Police Vishal Sharma said.
He said the assailant pumped eight bullets in Beni Singh's body and fled from the spot.
Beni Singh was killed barely 100 meters of a polling booth near his home when he was going to cast his vote, the police said.
Locals and Singhs relative created a ruckus after the incident following which the SP and other officials reached the spot to pacify them.
Police said they have sent the body to the Sadar Hospital for post-mortem and are conducting raids to trace the attacker.
The SP said the situation is under control now. Bittu Singh, who is lodged in the Bhagalpur Central Jail, faces more than 12 murder and extortion cases in the district.
Meanwhile, in another incident, police had to open fire in the air to disperse a crowd from a polling booth at Alinagar village under the Dhamdaha constituency as they tried to disturb the poll process, police said.
They said the trouble started when paramilitary force personnel on poll duty asked voters to maintain proper queue. This piqued some of delinquent voters who tried to create a ruckus at the booth and attacked the paramilitary personnel, leaving one of them injured, police said.
Police fired in the air to disperse the crowd, they said.
Later, voting resumed at the polling booth and continued without disruption, they said, adding four people have been arrested over the incident.