Police officials said that Singh reached Bhardwaj’s office at 8.15 pm in his official Qualis along with his PSO, ASI Jawahar Singh and driver-head constable Linu Ram.

“Bhardwaj’s help Krishna told Singh that he was not in. Singh then called Bhardwaj on his cellphone who came back. The two sat and drank and chatted,” a police official said.

Gurgaon Police Commissioner Mohinder Lal said that Bhardwaj sent the policemen accompanying Singh to a nearby petrol pump. A little later, Bhardwaj also sent Krishna out, asking him to get candles because of power failure in the area. This was when the murder was committed.

Bhardwaj got into his car and drove to Signature Towers and then surrendered. Before he was placed under arrest, he told reporters that he took the step because Singh had been threatening to kill him.

“For the last six months, Singh Bhaisahab (this is how he referred to Singh) was putting pressure on me to pay his dues. I was not able to collect the money. Bhaisahab told me that he would kill me. So I killed him... because I was afraid,” Bhardwaj said.

Preliminary investigations suggest that two years ago Singh had given Bhardwaj approximately Rs 50 lakh to “invest”.

“He (Bhardwaj) told us that business was bad and he wasn’t able to double Singh’s money as promised. He claims he had even attempted suicide in between. A suicide note he had prepared was discovered at home and they stopped him,” a senior police official said.

... contd.