Councillor murder: Prime suspect arrested

Chennai: Police on Wednesday arrested the prime accused in the July 9 murder of AIADMK councillor Mullai Gnanasekar at Manali.
A court later sent Vijay Anand, who was picked up from a relative's house at Wallajabad in Kancheepuram district, to jail. Police inquiries found that 55-year-old Gnanasekar was close to Anand's family and even funded the youth's education.He also helped the family come out of a financial crisis.
Anand, however, nursed dreams of becoming a councillor and considered the older man a hindrance in his way, police said. He then hired three killers to eliminate Gnanasekar. On July 9, Gnanasekar was sitting in the shop of a man named Tundaram around 5.45pm when two men, wearing helmets, arrived. Soon, another man without a helmet joined them. When Tundaram raised an alarm, the gang warned him and forced him to hide in the strongroom of his shop.
The three men then set upon Gnanasekar with sharp weapons and left him to die. A case was registered and over ther next few days, based on CCTV camera footage from the shop, police arrested Jebakumar, Prabhu, Raju, Rajendran, Kumarvel, Muthuraj, Ganesh and Karthi, the last three being the killers.