Shukla, along with his associates Anuj Pratap Singh and Sudhir Tripathi, were in a blue Cielo in Vasundhara Enclave when a joint team of the UP and Delhi Police started chasing them. While the police claim to have fired at least 45 rounds, the gangsters fired 12 rounds.

The car rammed into some trees before coming to halt and there were bullet marks on it. Two packets of incense sticks lay on the rear of the car. A Pepsi glass and a few blood stained papers were also found on the rear seat.

Despite heavy rains, blood was flowing on to the road even three hours after the encounter. Two .38 bore revolvers, 14 live and 12 empty cartridges and Rs 50,000 in cash was recovered from the possession of the gangsters.

No policeman was reportedly injured in the incident. The special task force (constituted to fight mafia gangs in UP) had been chasing the gangsters from Delhi. The investigating officials received a tip-off that Shukla was in the Capital since the past five days. He had rented accommodation in Vasant Kunj in south-west Delhi. Shukla intended to fly to Ranchi this morning but instead went back to Ghaziabad.

The Ghaziabad police claim that Shukla was involved in at least 26 cases of heinous crime including murders and kidnappings. Addl DIG (UP) Ajai Rai Sharma told ENS: ``Shukla was involved in some of the most sensational cases. Though he loved AK-47s he could kill with any small weapon. The police was under pressure to arrest him. Though Shukla had been operating since 1993 he had intensified his operations since the past three years. His area of operations stretched from Calcutta to Jaipur through Lucknow, Muzaffarpur and Patna.''

Shukla's first act of crime involved the murder of a boy who was teasing his sister in Daudpur. After killing him, he fled to Bangkok and stayed there for two years. On returning to India, he started working for various gangs. He worked for the Suraj Bhan gang for a long time and eliminated many of his enemies.

Shukla allegedly killed Bihar ex-minister Brij Vihari Prasad inside the Sanjay Gandhi hospital premises in Patna on June 13 this year. He had also allegedly killed R.K Singh, a sub-inspector of the UP police, during an earlier encounter in Lucknow. The police claims that Shukla extorted large sums of money from several industrialists in UP and Bihar and that he often worked in association with the dreaded Suraj Bhan gang.

According to the police, he interfered in the floating of tender contracts by the Indian Railways and in the process killed whoever obstructed his moves. Shukla allegedly murdered eminent UP proprietor Komal Rastogi and kidnapped his son Kunal Rastogi in May this year. He kept Kunal in custody for 36 days and demanded more than Rs 1 crore to release him. He had also kidnapped well known Bihar builder Mulraj Arora this year.

According to the police, ``Shukla never demanded ransom below cash amounting to Rs 50 lakh. All his deals were between Rs 50 lakh and a few crore.'' Shukla carried a reward of Rs two lakh on his head.

The UP Chief Minister has announced a reward amounting to Rs one lakh to each member of the STF team.

He said the government would also consider out-of-turn promotions for them. He said the reward of Rs two lakh on Shukla's head would be distributed among members of the STF.