Ranchi, Oct. 30: Police have prepared its list of suspects in the murder case of Shravan Chouhan and Pintu Singh. The list includes the secretary of Kranti Puja Samiti Anand Verma.

Chouhan and Singh were shot dead at a puja pandal on Diwali day in front of 150 people.The murder took place at HEC Township under Jagannathpur police station area.

Senior police superintendent, M.S. Bhatia, today said “police is focusing on Anand” but refused to make further comment in the matter.

Bhatia, however, said that “the murder was the result of gang war” and “the case will be solved soon”. He also said that all the details related with the suspects were being collected and process of collection of evidence was on.

Officer-in-charge of Jagannathpur police station, K.P. Yadav, also confirmed that Verma was in the suspect list and said: “apparently this was the reason that he could not collect the list of members of the puja committee despite repeated efforts.”

Yadav said that the case will be solved once two important eyewitnesses of the case come in police custody. “We are looking for Naresh Singh alias Butru and Kanhaiya, who were close associates of Shravan and were present at the time of crime. Though we probed an eyewitness, Nirmal Singh, but could not collect much information,” he added.

Residents of HEC Township did not express any astonishment on the suspicion of police saying it was quiet possible. “Anand is a close friend of Dhoomal Singh, a notorious gangster of the state, who also holds the president’s post of puja committee despite being at jail in Bihar. He possess a rifle with rifleman and is associated with the business of building construction and his business was growing with a surprising pace,” a resident said requesting anonymity.

Though police are busy solving the case, some of the locality residents complained that the crime was a result of poor policing. “It needs inquiry why police constables were not deputed at the puja pandal, which witnessed presence of gangsters and murders,” a locality resident said.

When asked about this, Bhatia said the constables are deputed only when puja organisers demand. “It is not possible for the police to mark its presence at every place all the time,” he added.

An FIR has been registered against unidentified persons in the case. No one has been arrested in the case so far.