With the arrest of four persons, the Punjab Police on Tuesday claimed to have solved most of the cases of targeted killings, including the sensational killing of Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) leader Jagdish Gagneja.

Addressing a Press conference with the Director General of Police (DGP), Suresh Arora, the  Chief Minister (CM) Amarinder Singh said with the arrest of four persons, a major conspiracy to fan communal disturbances and destabilise the state, hatched by the Pakistan’s  Inter Services Intelligence (ISI) and radical elements in other countries has been unravelled.

Though the state government had handed over the case of the killing of RSS state vice president Brigadier (retired) Jagdish Gagneja to the CBI, the state police had cracked this case too with the busting of the latest terror module. The CM said it’s eighth such module to be smashed since his government took charge in March.

Last month’s murder case of another RSS leader Ravinder Gosain has also been solved with these arrests, which have been linked to most of the cases of targeted killings that have taken place in Ludhiana, Khanna and Jalandhar since January 2016, the CM said, citing police investigations and interrogation of the suspects.

The conspirators who have been arrested include a gangster, Dharmendra alias Guggni, lodged in Nabha jail, further endorsing the suspicions of a growing nexus between radicals and gangsters, Amarinder further revealed.

Giving details, the CM said the interrogation of the four conspirators showed that they had met and been trained in various places abroad and had been using encrypted mobile software/ apps for communication with handlers based in Pakistan and some western countries.

The ISI was always looking out to disturb the country’s peace and to radicalize the youth, said the CM.

He said it was evident from the investigations that the targeted killings were aimed at fanning communal disturbances to further ISI’s anti-India game-plan since there were strong indications of the active involvement of Pakistani intelligence operatives based in Pakistan and foreign soil.

Three of the suspects have been identified as Jimmy Singh (a Jammu resident who recently returned to India from UK after spending many years there, and was picked up a week ago from Delhi’s IGI airport), Jagtar Singh Johal alias Jaggi (a UK national who got married just last month and was apprehended in Jalandhar), Dharmender @ Guggni (a gangster from Meharban in Ludhiana who was supplying weapons to the killers).

The fourth culprit, who was the main shooter in the various cases, was caught this afternoon and details about him were not disclosed.