Lucknow, Mar7 : Former Uttar Pradesh minister Raghuraj Pratap Singh alias Raja Bhaiya was named as an accused in the murder of Deputy Superintendent of Police (DSP) Zia-ul-Haq on Thursday by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), based on a complaint filed by Haq’s widow, Parveen Azad.

Raja Bhaiya has also been charged with criminal conspiracy after Parveen alleged that the former minister, an Independent legislator from Kunda, had conspired to kill her husband.

Officials said that with the charges converted to murder under Section 302 of the IPC, the arrest of Raja Bhaiya is now imminent, and added that the CBI team investigating the matter could interrogate him and then arrest him.

The CBI took charge of the case late on Wednesday, and began its probe today into the killing of Haq, Bilaspur village headman Nanhe Yadav and his brother Suresh Yadav.

Four others — Rohit Singh, Guddu Singh, Om Srivastava and Gulshan Yadav — have also been accused in the Haq murder case. Following his name figuring in the FIR filed by Parveen, Raja Bhaiya had quit the one-year-old Akhilesh Yadav ministry.

While Yadav has so far fended off questions on the likelihood of the arrest of Raja Bhaiya, he said the law will be allowed to take its own course.

He also said that the case has been handed over to the CBI and that it would act further on it. (ANI)