Haryana firm MD, 3 staffers held for killing NHAI consultant in Jaipur | Jaipur News

JAIPUR: The murder of a National Highway Authority of India (NHAI) project consultant, who was shot dead here on August 26 in broad daylight when he had stepped out for a smoke from a meeting with representatives of a Haryanabased multi-crore highway construction company, has led to the arrest of the managing director and three employees of the company.
Police said the murder was a result of disagreements between the two over changes in design and extension of time in the construction of 14 foot-overbridges (FoBs) on the Jaipur-Delhi national highway number 8. Two contract killers were given Rs 15 lakh for the murder, added police.
The accused include Karandeep Sheoran (29), the owner of E5 Infrastructure Private Limited and a resident of Gurgaon, Naveen Bisla (31) a resident of Panchkula, Vikas Singh (33) and Amit Nehra (26), both residents of Gurgaon.

Deputy commissioner of police (DCP), west, Richa Tomar said all the accused worked with Sheoran. Two sharpshooters, who fired at NHAI consultant Rajinder Kumar Chawla, are still on the run, she added.
NHAI consultant had repeatedly refused to accept bribes, say cops
Additional DCP, west, Ram Singh said that the weapon was also arranged by Sheoran. Sheoran’s staffers had travelled with the shooters from Gurgaon to Jaipur and dropped them near Amrapali Circle. When Chawla stepped out of the meeting to smoke a cigarette, the accused shot him dead, said Singh.
Police said chief accused Karandeep Sheoran’s company has been involved in multiple projects across the country. “The company is based in Hisar in Haryana and has its corporate office in Gurgaon. The company had taken up many highways and civil construction projects in different states including J&K, Punjab, Haryana, Gujarat, Andhra Pradesh and one in Nepal,” said Singh.

Police said that NHAI last year had shortlisted Sheoran’s company for the construction of 14 FOBs on the Gurgaon-Kotputli-Jaipur stretch of NH-8 for Rs 35 crore. These FOBs were sanctioned to be constructed as single span, which meant that there should not be any pillar underneath the bridges. The construction timeline was sanctioned for completion by August 2021.
NHAI had also roped in a private firm to monitor the project’s pace, and Chawla was recruited by the firm as its project consultant, also known as the authority engineer for overseeing the construction and its technical aspects. The FOB project soon ran into trouble because of continuous delays in construction and its design. Police said that Sheoran wanted modification in tender conditions including changing its design from single-span to double-span along with an extension of time (EOT).

“Double span FOB also saves cost, therefore, the company sought changes in designs and drawings,” Singh said.
Police said that a conditional approval in FOBs’ designs was given to Sheoran with a rider that NHAI will conduct a cost comparative analysis because the previously estimated cost of Rs 35 crore was based on singlespan bridges but since double-span construction would cost less, the officials decided for the revision of construction cost.
Meanwhile, even as the project dragged on, the NHAI issued a penalty of Rs 3.5 crore on Sheoran. The accused tried to persuade Chawla on different occasions but he did not respond to the allurements, said police.
“For Sheoran, Rs 35 crore did not matter as his firm had made a turnover of Rs 700 crore last year. He feared that the penalty could lead to serious crisis of reputation,” an official said, adding that the accused hired gunmen who shot dead Chawla when he had come to attend a meeting in Vaishali Nagar office of NHAI on August 26.