The Delhi Police Special Cell said on Saturday that it had stopped a planned Bollywood actor attack and arrested two men accused of planning it. The arrests, made in Delhi and Mumbai, also broke up an extortion plot aimed at a businessman in the capital, police said. The two men were identified as Vikas Thakur, also known as Vicky, and Deep, also known as Deepak Singh. Police said both men were acting on the instructions of a gangster based abroad. The actor was not named in the police statement.
The operation was led by Inspector Pankaj Chauhan and Inspector Suresh Chand Chaudhary, and supervised by Assistant Commissioner of Police Vivek Tyagi. Police said Thakur, a resident of Jalandhar in Punjab, had travelled from Mumbai to Delhi to shoot a prominent local businessman. The shooting was planned as part of an extortion demand, according to the police account. A case was registered at the Delhi Special Cell police station under Section 25 of the Arms Act, on the basis of a first information report dated 3 November. Thakur was arrested in Delhi. The Delhi Police said the planned Bollywood actor attack was one of two plots the two men were linked to.
How the Bollywood actor attack plot came to light
Police said the arrest of Thakur led them to the second accused. Deep, a resident of Tarn Taran in Punjab, was arrested in Mumbai after officers tracked his movements across states. Police said he had been asked to stay on in Mumbai so that he could carry out the planned Bollywood actor attack. The motive given by police was the actor’s alleged remarks about the Sikh community in connection with the events of 1984. Another shooter was expected to reach Mumbai to take part in the plan, police said.
The police statement did not name the actor. It described the intended target as a prominent actor in the Hindi film industry, and said the plan had been put together by a fugitive gangster based outside India. Officers said the two arrests had prevented the planned Bollywood actor attack from being carried out. The investigation is still open, and police said they were looking into the wider network behind the two men.
The Bollywood actor attack and the Mad Sandhu case
Deep is also an accused in the killing of Instagram influencer Mad Sandhu in Amritsar on 3 October. Police said Deep and an associate, Palwinder, also known as Kaka, were accused of carrying out the killing on the instructions of the same gangster based abroad. Deep had been on the run since the killing, and had been hiding in Mumbai for nearly a month before his arrest, police said. His arrest in Mumbai came after officers followed leads from the arrest of Thakur in Delhi.
The case has drawn attention because of a separate incident involving actor Tiger Shroff. Police suspect that the shooters involved in a firing incident near Shroff’s car had earlier carried out a recce of the home of the actor named as the target of the planned Bollywood actor attack. The firing took place outside a sports facility in Juhu, Mumbai, and Shroff’s driver was injured. Four more people were arrested in that case in October. Police have not said whether the two cases share the same handlers, and the link remains part of the investigation.
What police said after the Bollywood actor attack arrests
Police said the arrests showed how the network behind the planned Bollywood actor attack used shooters based in different states. Thakur was picked up in Delhi after he arrived from Mumbai, while Deep was traced to Mumbai after the killing in Amritsar. Officers said the two men were in contact with handlers abroad, and that the instructions reached them through intermediaries. The police have not given details of the weapons seized, if any, and have not said when the two men will be produced in court.
The Special Cell said its officers were still questioning the two men and tracing their contacts in Punjab, Delhi and Mumbai. The actor at the centre of the planned Bollywood actor attack has not been named, and police have not said whether he has been given protection. A police spokesperson said more arrests were possible as the investigation moved forward.