Director General of Police (DGP) Prashant Kumar said Sumit Singh always carried an AK-47 assault rifle. Both the assault rifle and a 9mm semi-automatic pistol were recovered from his possession. Sumit carried a reward of ₹1 lakh on his head and was allegedly involved in multiple murders at the behest of different mafia gangs in Uttar Pradesh and Bihar, he said.

Another STF official said Sumit Singh, a resident of UP’s Mau district, had as many as 23 criminal cases registered against him in different districts of eastern Uttar Pradesh and Bihar between 2009 and 2015. Singh’s involvement surfaced in as many as 10 sensational killings in U.P. and Bihar, including the daylight murder of BJP MP’s representative Srikant Bharti in Bihar’s Siwan district in 2012 and the killing of businessman Parshuram Tiwari and his son in Balia in 2014.

STF Deputy Superintendent of Police (DSP) DK Shahi shared further details, informing that the STF, along with the Jaunpur police, laid a trap for the accused after receiving information about Sumit Singh’s movement from Shahganj in Jaunpur. He said the deceased, along with his two accomplices, was traveling in a Bolero jeep and carried several weapons with them.

Shahi informed that Sumit opened indiscriminate fire when the police team tried to intercept the jeep at the Pili River bridge under Badlapur police station limits. In the ensuing retaliatory fire, Sumit suffered bullet wounds and succumbed while being rushed to a nearby hospital. The police recovered a Bolero Jeep, an assault rifle, and a semi-automatic pistol from his possession. He added that two of Sumit’s accomplices managed to escape, taking advantage of the darkness during the encounter.