• Supreme Court cancels bail of actor Darshan and other 6 accused
• Police told to take accused into custody immediately
• Bengaluru Police form seven teams to arrest all accused

Bengaluru: Following directions by Supreme Court this morning to take all 7 accused into custody immediately after setting aside the bail granted to them by Karnataka High Court in Renukaswamy murder case, Bengaluru City Police have formed 7 teams to trace and take all of them into custody including actor Darshan.

The accused are: Darshan, Pavithra, Anu Kumar, M. Lakshman, Jagadeesh, Pradosh S. Rao and R. Nagaraju.

According to sources, the Police teams immediately left for Darshan and Pavithra Gowda’s residences located at Rajarajeshwari Nagar in Bengaluru and also Darshan’s wife Vijayalakshmi’s apartment in Hosakerehalli.

The Police were stationed in front of their houses to ensure their arrest. Soon as the Supreme Court announced its judgement, cancelling their bail, Pavithra Gowda’s advocate Narayanaswamy arrived at her residence.

Two arrested

At about 1.50 pm, Police arrested A1 Pavithra Gowda and A14 Pradosh. The Police are said to be questioning about Darshan’s whereabouts, as he was neither found at his residence nor at his wife’s residence.

Following the completion of arrest procedures, the Police will take the accused for medical tests before handing them over to prison authorities.

Meanwhile, sources said that Darshan, is said to be returning from Sathyamangalam in Tamil Nadu where he had been to attend a horse fair. He is expected to return to Bengaluru at about  4 pm today from where he will be picked up by the Police.

The Bengaluru City Police teams were led by Byatarayanapura Sub-Division ACP Bharath Reddy, in the absence of Investigation Officer (IO) ACP Chandan Kumar, who is said to be on leave.

Case history

It may be mentioned that, Darshan was arrested on June 11, 2024, for his alleged role in the June 9 murder of Renukaswamy, who allegedly stalked and abused Pavithra Gowda, on social media in Bengaluru.

The members of his gang, including Pavithra Gowda, were arrested after investigations revealed that the actor allegedly paid a few men for the murder.

Horsing around…

While many would be worried when their bail hearing is underway, not actor Darshan. Even though  Supreme Court had reprimanded the Karnataka High Court for granting actor Darshan bail in a murder case, even calling it as perverse, the actor seemed quite relaxed today.

As the news of the actor’s bail being cancelled made rounds, the Police too were busy making rounds to track the actor’s whereabouts to take him back to jail. To their surprise, the actor was on a passion project. He was at a Horse Fair in Sathyamangalam, Tamil Nadu.

It is well-known that the actor is passionate about horses and is known to be a horse breeder, especially kathiawari horses. In the time, while he was on bail, the actor had begun acting again and had travelled to various locales for shoot in India and Thailand. He had also gone on a temple run and it seemed life was back to normal for him, until now.

Then Police Chief, now ADGP Prisons

In a sheer coincidence, B. Dayananda, who in his previous stint as Bengaluru City Police Commissioner, had supervised the team led by ACP Chandan Kumar to arrest actor Darshan in Mysuru on June 11, 2024, in the Renukaswamy murder case, will again come face-to-face with the actor at Parappana Agrahara Central Prison, as he is presently the ADGP, Prisons and                                          Correctional Services.

In fact, B. Dayananda had sent a proposal to the State Government to challenge the Karnataka High Court’s decision in the Supreme Court, over granting bail to Darshan and other accused in the murder case.

The Bengaluru Police had also initiated an inquiry into five-star treatment  extended to the actor in the jail, during the tenure of Dayananda, as Police Commissioner.