False lead and new footage later, Saif Ali Khan stabbing accused remains elusive | Mumbai News

In the morning, the Bandra police detained a “suspect” and brought him in for questioning. But five hours later, he was let go as police found that he had no link with the case. Police sources said the man was picked up as he resembled the accused, who was caught on CCTV at Saif’s building, and had a history of petty crime.

Police also questioned a carpenter who worked at Saif’s building recently, as well as some other workers there. The carpenter’s family said he worked at the family residence but had nothing to do with the attack.

With this line of investigation yielding no result so far, the police appeared to be back to square one. Later in the evening, however, police sources said they found that the suspect had been caught on another CCTV, which indicated that he changed clothes after exiting the actor’s building.

The breakthrough came while police were scanning CCTVs in Bandra, and one camera ostensibly showed the suspect, dressed in a half-sleeve light blue shirt, near Lucky Junction. In the earlier CCTV footage from Satguru Sharan building’s fire exit, the accused was seen wearing a half-sleeve black T-shirt.

“The fact that the accused changed clothes indicates he could be a hardened criminal. The hunt has been intensified, and CCTVs from nearby railway stations are being checked,” said an officer.

Further, police sources said the suspect made it a point to cover his face with a red scarf and a cap to elude the cameras at the building.

An officer said they have shared the photo of the suspect with almost everyone in the over 40,000-strong force and with retired officers, but no one has identified him so far.

Photographs have also been shared with several taxi and auto unions.

“With the publicity given to the photograph, if anyone in the city had seen him, they would have approached us. But that has not happened,” the officer said.

The officer said that in several robbery cases, the accused are also into drug consumption. “We called in several persons who have drug cases registered against them, especially those who looked similar to the accused, and questioned them. That has not yielded anything either,” the officer said.

Based on the preliminary investigation of the crime scene and review of the building where Khan stays with his family in a duplex (11th and 12th floor), the police suspect that the intruder first jumped through the back gate of the building to enter the premises. Once he entered the building, he avoided CCTV cameras and took the fire exit stairs till some point. He has been captured on CCTV climbing up the floors barefoot at 1.38 am with his face covered.

He is then suspected to have used a two-foot-wide shaft to enter the bathroom of Khan’s younger child from where he gained entry into the house on the 11th floor. This is the initial theory shared by officers involved in the investigation.

After a scuffle with the intruder, Khan and the others managed to push him in the child’s room, following which they all escaped and closed the room from outside. Police officers said that as the family rushed to the 12th floor of the house for safety, the accused most likely used the toilet window and exited through the same narrow shaft that he used to enter the house. He then reached the fire exit stairs and was captured on a CCTV camera on the sixth floor of the building.

Police said the security arrangements at the building are not strict. There were two guards at the main gate and one at the back gate. Officers said that for such a high-profile building in Bandra, the society has inadequate CCTV coverage. Local vendors outside the building told The Indian Express that the security guards stationed at the gate would often allow them to enter the building and visit apartments without verifying whether an order was placed.

Police sources said they are tapping their network of informers and history sheeters to get leads on the suspect. They are also analysing their database on history sheeters who match the description of the suspect caught on CCTV.

Bhajan Singh, the auto driver who drove Saif to the hospital, meanwhile recalled that when he first saw the actor, he was drenched in blood and could barely walk. He said that when they reached Lilavati Hospital, there was a guard standing at the entrance. It was only then that he realised who was in his auto. “He (Saif) said, call him (the guard) quickly, ‘Main Saif Ali Khan hoon (I am Saif Ali Khan)’. A stretcher was brought, and he got on it,” Singh said.