Bengaluru: A 37-year-old man was arrested on Friday in connection with the murder of Kannada journalist Gauri Lankesh six months ago, police said.

"Naveen Kumar has been arrested by the Special Investigation Team (SIT) probing the case and evidence collected so far confirmed he is an accused in the Gauri Lankesh murder," SIT Investigation Officer M.N. Anucheth said.

He is reportedly linked to the Sanatan Sanstha outfit and its affiliate the Hindu Janajagruti Samiti and hails from Birur town in Chikmagalur district.

Kumar was taken into custody by the SIT on March 2 for questioning after he was booked by the Crime Branch on February 19 under the Arms Act for illegal possession of 15 bullets of a revolver.

A city court on Friday extended Kumar's police custody till March 15.

"In the interest of protecting witnesses and further investigation, we cannot reveal his role in the Gauri Lankesh case at this juncture," Anucheth said.

"Based on certain clues provided by him, the SIT took him into custody for further questioning and investigation," Anucheth had said earlier.

 

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Hyderabad (PTI): The South Central Railway on Saturday announced that it would run four special trains to manage the surge in passengers resulting from the large-scale cancellation of IndiGo flights here.

The move comes as flyers face significant disruption and long queues at the airport due to the cancellation.

A press release from the SCR said it is running the special trains to clear the extra rush of passengers to Chennai, Mumbai and Shalimar (Kolkata) from Hyderabad today.

Meanwhile, as many as 43 outbound Indigo flights were cancelled from here on Saturday, Rajiv Gandhi International Airport sources said.

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Similarly, 26 incoming flights are also likely to be cancelled during the day, they said.

The flight cancellations drew ire from passengers, who thronged the IndiGo counters at the airport demanding to know the exact situation.

“This is utter nonsense! Digiyatra done, message received that departure has been rescheduled ahead of the scheduled departure and now upon arriving at Hyderabad airport coming to know at the security checkpoint that Indigo flight is cancelled,” Tarun Singha, former Ministry of Defence spokesperson said in a post on X.

“But the thing is if you don’t shout they do nothing. Example at Hyderabad Airport, there was no staff no flight information for an hour. Then a fellow passenger started shouting on mic and an Indigo staff appeared finally,” a netizen said in a post.

On Friday, when IndiGo cancelled over 1,000 flights from across airports, its CEO Pieter Elbers apologised in a video message for the major inconvenience caused to passengers due to the disruptions.

In the one-way video communication, Elbers also said that the airline was expecting fewer than 1,000 flights on Saturday.