Zubeen Garg’s cousin and Assam Police DSP Sandipan Garg was arrested on Wednesday in connection with the singer-composer’s death in Singapore last month.
With this, the number of arrests in the case has risen to five since October 1.
Deputy superintendent of police Sandipan Garg was taken into custody from the state CID office after multiple rounds of questioning over the past few days. He was produced in a local court which remanded him to seven days in police custody.
State CID chief M.P. Gupta announced the arrest of the police officer who is posted in Kamrup district.
Sandipan had accompanied the singer-composer to participate in the North East Festival on September 20. The singer died on September 19.
The quartet arrested before Sandipan in the case registered by the state CID included festival organiser Shyamkanu Mahanta, the singer’s manager Siddharth Sharma, his band members Sekharjyoti Goswami and Amritprabha Mahanta.
An engineering graduate, Sandipan is a 2021-22 batch APS officer hailing from Jorhat, which is also the singer’s home town in Upper Assam. The cousins were close and the Singapore trip was reportedly Sandipan’s first overseas trip.
The SIT probing the celebrated singer’s death is also set to issue fresh summons to the non-resident Indians (NRIs) in Singapore, who were with Zubeen on the day he died while swimming, to join the probe.
Of the 11 persons based in Singapore, who were summoned in connection with the case, only one, Rupkamal Kalita, appeared before the SIT on Tuesday. Kalita was also questioned on Wednesday.
Zubeen’s wife, Garima Saikia Garg, on Tuesday had expressed her unhappiness with those not cooperating with the ongoing probe. She said the family only wanted to know the truth about what exactly happened on that day in Singapore leading to Zubeen’s demise, which brought the state to a standstill for almost five days amid growing demand for a thorough and transparent probe.
Two of Zubeen’s personal security officers — Paresh Baishya and Nandeswar Bora — have also been suspended over allegations of diversion of funds belonging to
the singer.