Hamid Dabholkar, son of the slain rationalist thinker and founder of Maharastra Andhshradha Nirmulan Samiti, said there is a "striking similarity" between the three murders.
A foreign sea explorer agency recovered the firearm from a creek in neighbouring Thane district of Maharashtra.
The Bombay high court on Thursday granted bail to Vikram Bhave, an accused in the killing of rationalist Narendra Dabholkar in 2013.
Political parties and social organisations have called for a bandh in Pune on Wednesday to protest the murder of anti-superstition crusader Narendra Dabholkar.
A local court on Saturday remanded Virendra Tawade, a member of Hindu Janjagruti Samiti and an accused in the murder of rationalist Narendra Dabholkar, to Central Bureau of Investigation custody till June 16.
The CCTV footage, recovered by cops immediately after murder of rationalist Narendra Dabholkar on Tuesday, has not yielded any concrete clues on the identity of the unknown assailants who gunned down the activist on a Pune bridge during a morning walk.
'Now, it feels like the darkness has descended again.'
The two -- Amit Raghavendra Baddi and Ganesh Miski -- both residents of Hubballi, were arrested on Sunday, special investigating officer M N Anucheth said.
Rushikesh Devdikar alias Murali, 44, who was absconding was arrested on Thursday from his hideout at Katras in Dhanbad district of Jharkhand, the SIT said in a statement. According to the probe team, Devdikar was part of the conspiracy to kill Lankesh. He is accused number 18 in the case.
Neeta Kolhatkar reports on the mysterious murder of Maharashtra's leading rationalist, Dr Narendra Dabholkar, in Pune on Tuesday.
So far, six people, including Hindu Janajagruti Samiti member and ENT surgeon Virendrasinh Tawde, Sachin Andure and Sharad Kalaskar, have been arrested by the CBI in connection with the killing of Dabholkar.
The conspiracy was hatched by Virendra Sinh Tawde (already arrested), Kalaskar and others, CBI lawyer said.
Acclaimed writer Nayantara Sahgal, the niece of India's first prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru, has returned the prestigious Sahitya Akademi Award to protest against the "vicious assault" on India's diversity and the government's failure to protect cultural diversity.
Mahatma Gandhi's great-grandson Tushar Gandhi on Thursday opposed a ban on the Sanatan Sanstha, which is under scan for the murder of rationalist Narendra Dabholkar, saying banning any organisation is "undemocratic".
The Prevention and Eradication of Human Sacrifice and other evil and Aghori practices Act, which faced immense opposition for over seven years, was passed in the Maharashtra State Vidhan Sabha (lower house) on Friday.
"We strongly condemn the allegation levelled by Shyam Manav... Hypnotism does not possess the power to make a person do violent act," said the spokesperson of the Sanstha, Abhay Vartak, at a press conference in Mumbai.
An unidentified body with two bullet injuries has been found at a village in Belagavi district and police were verifying if it resembled the sketch of one of the two killers of writer M M Kalburgi, who was gunned down at Dharwad in August.
The Shiv Sena attacked BJP-led government over failure to arrest the killers of communist leader Govind Pansare.
The Maharashtra government will examine if the controversial outfit Hindu Rashtra Sena could be banned in the wake of Pune techie Mohsin Shaikh's murder, Home Minister R R Patil said in Mumbai.
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Sanatan Sanstha, the Hindu right-wing group often at loggerheads with Narendra Dabholkar, on Wednesday sought to distance itself from the anti-superstition activist's killing.
The Maharashtra government has further beefed up the 'Z' security cover of social activist Anna Hazare in view of letters threatening him with dire consequences.
The police haven't yet made any arrest in the killing of Narendra Dabholkar, five days after the eminent rationalist was shot dead that sparked an outrage and prompted the Maharashtra government to go in for an anti superstition and black magic ordinance.
Facing heat over a long list of writers who have returned Sahitya Akademi awards or resigned from their posts in the literary body, Bharatiya Janata Party on Tuesday denied that it was being soft on the issue of "intolerance" and said the ideological inclinations of the writers should be looked into.
'Why she was killed? Because she believed in a certain ideology, she wrote and spoke on that'
The HC asked the investigators to look beyond their current line of probe to apprehend the culprits.
Teams of Maharashtra ATS and Mumbai police have been roped in to assist the Kolhapur police in the probe on the attack on the veteran communist leader Govind Pansare and his wife.
Claiming that there was a link between the accused in the two cases, the CBI on Friday took the custody of Bangera and Digvekar from the Karnataka SIT.
A bench of Justices S C Dharamadhikari and B P Colabawalla summoned Maharashtra home department's additional chief secretary on March 28 to explain the cause of the slow progress made in the case.
The unidentified body found with two bullet injuries at a village in Belagavi district was not of one of the two killers of writer M M Kalburgi, but a criminal who was killed by his two brothers and his friend, a senior police official said here on Sunday.
Akolkar is believed to be linked to 'Sanatan Sanstha', a Hindu right-wing organization whose headquarters are located in Ponda, Goa. He has been on the run ever since his name cropped up during the NIA investigations in the Goa blast case.
With no headway in the police probe into the killing of anti-superstition activist Narendra Dabholkar nearly a month ago, a Public Interest Litigation has sought transfer of the case to the National Investigation Agency.
Union Home Minister Sushilkumar Shinde said on Sunday that the Centre cannot interfere in the sexual assault case against Tehelka Editor Tarun Tejpal.
Voicing displeasure over the Dadri lynching incident and a string of killings of rationalists, he also questioned Prime Minister Narendra Modi's continued silence on these.
Terming the BJP-led Maharashtra government a "total failure", Congress accused Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis of giving clean chits to several tainted ministers.
The Bombay High Court on Thursday sought to know from Maharashtra government if it has decided to seek a CBI probe in the Govind Pansare murder case as claimed by the lawyer of family of the slain activist, even as the prosecutor said he has no such instruction so far.
On the day the Maharashtra legislature passed the much-awaited anti-superstition bill, Thane district police arrested six men for murdering a 50-year-old woman in a ritual human sacrifice.
Maharashtra Home Minister R R Patil on Saturday said that his department has not given any clean chit to Hindu outfits in connection with the murder of rationalist activist Narendra Dabholkar.
"Are you pursuing it? How can an agency like CBI which falls under the Centre cannot procure the report?" the Bombay HC asked.
The train of writers returning government-conferred honours has now been joined by Vadodara-based author and poet Anil Joshi who announced that he will give up his Sahitya Akademi award over the recent killing of rationalist MM Kalburgi and a few others.
The sketches have reportedly been drawn based on the inputs from CCTV footage and description by eyewitnesses.
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