Rifleman kills havildar, shoots self

Sources said that the havildar punished the rifleman for not being regular and active in the training and they used to involve in frequent arguments.

The deceased were identified as Havildar Praveen Kumar Joshi (38) from Dehradun in Uttarakhand and rifleman Jaksheer Singh (21) from Punjab. Praveen was married and his family lives in Dehradun.

Police sources said that Jaksheer had been in the camp for the past eight months and he was not committed to the training. It is also reported that he used to skip training and stay in his room. Following that, Praveen gave him a warning and punished him, too.

Sources said that Praveen questioned Jaksheer on Monday morning for coming late and the latter verbally abused his superior.

Following the incident, Praveen punished Jaksheer. Later, Jaksheer started his guard duty around 3 am on Tuesday. The police said that he went near Praveen’s room while the latter was asleep.

Jaksheer entered the room and locked it from inside. He took his assault rifle and shot his superior on the chest and later shot himself on the stomach. On hearing the shots, others rushed in by breaking open the door and found them in a pool of blood. They were rushed to Nandambakkam military hospital, where the doctors declared them brought dead.

Major Ullas Kumar visited the spot and held inquires with other officers. The Major filed a complaint with the Pallavaram police on Tuesday morning. The police sent the bodies for post-mortem examination to the Rajiv Gandhi Government General Hospital and registered a case.