Inspector General (Kanpur Zone) B P Singh said: “Dohrey entered the court around 8 am along with his lawyer Pramod Bhadauria and confined himself in the room till he appeared before the CJM around 10.30 am. We wondered as to how he managed to get the court room opened before the scheduled time.”

He added: “We had received a tip-off about his decision to surrender. The police team reached the court around 9 am, only to find Dohrey already inside.”

Circle Officer of Auraiya, D K Rai, said usually an accused files an application before the designated court, appealing that he wants to surrender in a case registered against him. The court corroborates the facts with the police station concerned and then the accused is allowed to proceed. “But Dohrey did not submit any such application,” he added.

On the night of December 23, Gupta was killed inside his residence in the Gail Vihar Colony. Before attacking Gupta, the accused locked his wife Shashi in the bathroom. Gupta was beaten up and administered electric shocks.

It was alleged that Bahujan Samaj Party MLA Shekhar Tiwari and his associates had killed Gupta for his failure to give a huge sum for Chief Minister Mayawati’s birthday on January 15. Though Tiwari and three of his associates were arrested on December 24, there was confusion over the identity of two intruders.

From the bathroom, Shashi had heard her husband requesting one of the men: “Bhatia mujhe mat maro. Mujhe suspend kara do, barkhast kara do (Bhatia don’t kill me. Get me suspended or terminated).” She had also heard Gupta address another man as Tyagi. Initially, the police said Tyagi and Bhatia were engineers. But soon it became clear that Bhatia was Dohrey’s nickname. By then, Dohrey had fled.