Bihar doc gunned down while returning from clinic

A doctor was gunned down in Patna on Saturday night while returning home from his clinic.

Unidentified men opened fire on Rajnish Ranjan, 45, around 9:45pm in the Rajendra Nagar area of the Bihar capital.

He was returning on foot from his clinic nearby. Ranjan was rushed to a local hospital, where he was declared dead.

The police have yet to make any arrest in the case. Dhananjay, the guard of the apartment where the doctor stayed, was detained for interrogation.

"Ranjan had stopped at a nearby shop to buy biscuits. Armed criminals opened a fire on him near his apartment," a police officer said.

Ranjan's compounder, Ashok Kumar, found him in a pool of blood. Kumar raised an alarm and rushed him to a hospital with the help of passersby.

The doctor was declared dead within 10 minutes of being taken to the hospital. His body was sent for post-mortem.

Police said the deceased, who has served at Delhi's Safdarjung Hospital, was carrying two cell phones when he was attacked. One of them was a BlackBerry, which is missing.

"It seems the criminals took his cell phone," a police officer said, adding there was no eyewitness to the incident.

BN Jha, senior superintendent of police in charge of Patna, said, "We are investigating the matter from all possible angles. We have got some clues."