Police investigations reportedly revealed that Pratyush Mani Tripathi, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader who was allegedly murdered in Lucknow on December 3, planned the attack on himself. According to police investigations, Tripathi had planned the attack with his friends in order to claim police protection.
Jagran reported that Senior Superintendent of Police (SSP) Kalanidhi Naithani said CCTV cameras near to the location where Tripathi’s body was found showed his friends fleeing the site on their bikes. Upon police enquiries, the accused — Tripathi’s friends — accepted their crime, and were duly arrested.
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According to the Jagran report, Tripathi asked his friend Ashish Kumar to stab him with a knife. When Kumar refused, Tripathi asked another friend, Anil Rana to stab him. Reportedly, even as Rana stabbed him near the shoulder, the wound was not grievous, which led to Tripathi asking his friends to injure him further. Rana, then, stabbed him in the chest with the knife. The report mentioned that Tripathi was advised to stage this crime near Badshahnagar.
Reportedly, Tripathi had directed his friends to cause a scene at the Trauma Centre and had also made plans to call the media. Along with his plan to claim police protection, Tripathi also wanted to frame four Muslim persons — Salman, Zeeshan, Adnan and Shibu — with whom he had had an altercation on November 25.