KOCHI: After going underground for quite sometime, several criminal and quotation gangs with political backing have surfaced in the city suburbs.The murder of Nandagopan at Manjummal and the attack on a retired school teacher at Piravom are the latest incidents. While Nandagopan's murder was the fall out of a war between two gangs, the attack on N V John was carried out by a quotation gang to threaten him to withdraw his agitation against the land mafia.According to the police, Nandagopan was murdered allegedly by a gang led by Radhakrishnan after the two developed a strong animosity over a couple of years. "Nandagopan was an accused in the murder of a person identified as Raju who is said to be a member of a gang led by Radhakrishnan," said police officials.Radhakrishnan, during interrogation, revealed that he murdered Nandagopan as the latter had already decided to silence him. "If I had failed to act fast he would have done it first. It's a matter of survival," Radhakrishnan reportedly told the interrogators. City Assistant Commissioner of Police C A Anto said, "We cannot outrightly say that the murder was the result of a gang war. But it is certainly due to the animosity between two people. After the murder of Nandagopan we have been keeping track of the activities of certain suspects. We strongly suspect that there will be a retaliation in connection with the murder soon," Anto said. The police have taken all precautionary measures to prevent any untoward incidents in the region, he said.Police officials said that they had strengthened their surveillance in the suburbs to check the activities of suspected quotation gangs. "Though there are no direct inputs suggesting operation of quotation gangs in the city, some suspected elements are working for the land mafia in the suburbs to terrorise the residents and procure land from the people," police sources said.
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