The Assam Police on Friday shot dead a person accused of murder after he allegedly tried to escape during investigation, India Today reported.

The police had taken 33-year-old Shah Alom Talukdar to Guwahati’s Batahguli area to recover some items related to the kidnapping and murder case he had been arrested in last week, according to The Times of India. Deputy Commissioner of Police (Central) Diganta Kumar Choudhury claimed that Talukdar pushed away the police personnel holding him and fled towards a jungle area.

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Talukdar and four others had been arrested last week for allegedly killing a dairy farm distributor, Ranjit Bora, in November.

Since Himanta Biswa Sarma became the chief minister of the state in May 2021, Assam has seen a number of police shootings. An affidavit submitted by the Assam government to the Gauhati High Court said that 171 such incidents between May 2021 and August 2022 took place in the state. It also said 56 people had died and 145 were injured in police action.

Many of those injured and killed belonged to the state’s ethnic and religious minorities. A number of shootings also took place in the course of a police crackdown on drugs, which has been championed by the government.

Earlier this month, the Assam Human Rights Commission had found two officials guilty of killing a man accused of theft in an fake gunfight in 2021.