Killers of pvt firm MD and CEO arrested; owner of internet firm being quizzed over supari suspicion

BENGALURU: The Amruthahalli police have arrested three people in connection with the double murder of the managing director and CEO of a private company at Amruthahalli late afternoon on Tuesday. The arrested are Shabarish aka Felix, Santosh and Vinay Reddy. Five teams had been formed to trace the accused.

The police are also questioning Arun Kumar, the owner of Gnet Media on Bannerghatta Road, a competitor firm, to establish if he had given supari for the killing.

The three were arrested from a lodge in Kunigal.

Shabarish (27) aka Felix, a resident of Devarachikkanahalli on Bannerghatta road, Santosh (26), a resident of Marenahalli, and Vinay Reddy (23) a resident of Rupena Agrahara, had fled the city after committing the murder, but were traced to a lodge in Kunigal. They took a cab to Majestic and from there, boarded a train to Kunigal. When the police entered their lodge room, all the accused were consuming alcohol.

Arun Kumar and Shabarish had planned to eliminate Phanindra as the former was losing business and they had even planned to approach the court and obtain anticipatory bail today. They had also planned to make it look like a woman was involved in the whole episode, considering that Phanindra had divorced his wife.

Shabarish, Santosh, Vinay Reddy and Arun Kumar.

Arun Kumar had apparently warned Phanindra’s brother indirectly that he knows some ganja addicts and that if anything untoward happened, he would not be responsible. Phanindra had dismissed the threats thinking that such things are commonplace in business.

Following this, Arun Kumar and Shabarish hatched a plan to eliminat Phanindra. Accordingly, on Tuesday, Shabarish approached Phanindra on the pretext of seeking a job.

Phanindra Subramanian, the managing director of Air-on Aeronics Media Pvt Ltd, had recently fired Shabarish and used to shout at him when he was an employee. Angry over this, Shabarish killed Phanindra. The trio had no plans to kill the CEO Vinu Kumar, but when he tried to prevent the attack on Phanindra, he too was killed, the police said.

Phanindra has set up his own company last year.

Phanindra was earlier working with an internet service provide, Gnet Media, on Bannerghatta Road. Phanindra and Vinu were looking after the complete affairs of the company. Phanndra started Air-on Aeronics Media Pvt Ltd at Pampa Extension in Amruthahalli in 2022 and many from Gnet had joined his firm. The company also started making good profits in just seven months and during that time, Shabarish was fired from his job. Shabarish then went to Kashi and Mumbai where he worked for some time and had returned to Bengalur only recently, police said.

The building where Phanindra’s company was operating from.

Deputy Commissioner of Police Lakshmi Prasad said, “The three accused were nabbed from Kunigal and we are also questioning Arun Kumar of Gnet Media to establish if he was involved. The main accused Shabarish was earlier working with Gnet but he is now giving confusing statements. The trio came on a motorcycle and committed the double murder”.

Shabarish had posted an Instagram story of him tying the knot with a girl in a graveyard. He also wore a lot of bling in other videos. Before and after committing the murder, he had posted cryptic posts on his Instagram story.