India's most wanted fugitive, accused of more than 100 murders and on the run for decades, has been shot dead after driving into an elaborate police trap.
Koose Muniswamy Veerappan was known for his trademark handlebar moustache and said to be around 60 years old. His death brings to a close the longest manhunt in Indian police history.
The bandit, who gained notoriety when he held film star Rajkumar hostage for more than 100 days in 2000, was killed in a
forest in southeastern Tamil Nadu state.
Police acting on a tip-off surrounded Veerappan and three associates while they were travelling in an ambulance near
Dharmapuri in the west of the state late yesterday.
The four died in the ensuing shootout. Their bodies were taken to Dharmapuri hospital, where hundreds of locals turned up asking police to put Veerappan's body on public display.
Members of the police Special Task Force celebrated by exploding firecrackers at their Sathyamangalam camp.
Apart from poaching several hundred elephants for their tusks
and illegally felling thousands of sandalwood trees, Veerappan
allegedly murdered more than 100 people, mostly police and forest officials, as well as villagers he suspected of being police
informers.
As well as kidnapping Rajkumar, Veerappan also abducted former
Karnataka state minister Hannur Nagappa in 2002 and threatened to behead him unless a jailed Tamil nationalist leader was released.
Mr Nagappa was found dead three months after his disappearance.
