New Delhi: The Interpol has issued a Blue Notice against Saurabh and Gaurav Luthra, the owners of a Goa nightclub where a massive blaze has claimed 25 lives, to track their whereabouts, officials said Tuesday.
The Luthras have fled the country since the incident.
The Goa Police had approached the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) for the issuance of an Interpol Blue Notice against Saurabh and Gaurav Luthra, the owners of the Birch by Romeo Lane nightclub in Arpora, where the incident happened Saturday.
The Luthras are believed to have fled to Thailand’s Phuket, the officials said.
The massive fire at the nightclub, some 25 kilometres from Panaji, killed 25 people late Saturday night.
The deceased comprised 20 employees of the nightclub and five tourists, including four from Delhi. Five injured people are undergoing treatment at the government-run Goa Medical College and Hospital (GMCH).
The CBI immediately swung into action and approached the Interpol for the issuance of the Blue Notice against the two.
An Interpol colour-coded notice alerts all 196 member countries of the Lyon-based organisation about a member country’s request to find particular information.
The Blue Notice is one of the nine colour-coded notices available with the international police cooperation agency. It is issued to collect additional information about a person’s identity, location or activities in relation to a criminal investigation.
Another most sought after notice is the Red Notice, which calls for the detention of a fugitive and can only be issued after a chargesheet is filed and a non-bailable warrant issued against the wanted person. It seeks to locate and arrest people wanted for prosecution or to serve a sentence.
The Yellow Notice helps locate missing persons, often minors, or identify persons who are unable to identify themselves. The Black Notice is issued to seek information on unidentified bodies. The Green Notice is for warning about someone’s criminal activities, where the person is considered to be a possible threat to public safety.
The Orange Notice warns of an event, a person, an object or a process representing a serious and imminent threat to public safety, while the Purple Notice seeks or provides information on modus operandi, objects, devices and concealment methods used by criminals.
The Interpol’s United Nations Security Council Special Notice is issued for entities and individuals who are targets of the UN Security Council sanctions committees.
The organisation also introduced the Silver Notice early this year on a pilot basis to track illicit assets.
Meanwhile, the Goa Police has issued a Look Out Circular (LOC) against another set of owners of the nightclub, Ajay Gupta and Surinder Kumar Khosla, who is a British citizen, Deputy Inspector General (DIG) of Police Varsha Sharma said in Panaji Tuesday.
Two Goa government officers have also been asked to join the investigation.
Police have so far arrested five people — the nightclub’s chief general manager Rajiv Modak, general manager Vivek Singh, bar manager Rajiv Singhania, gate manager Riyanshu Thakur and Bharat Kohli.
