A Tamil separatist believed to have plotted the assassination of ex-prime minister Rajiv Gandhi committed suicide with six other militants Tuesday as police surrounded his hideout, authorities said.
The separatist, known as Sivarasan, shot himself through the temple. The others swallowed cyanide capsules before police stormed their refuge near this southern city, said police commissioner R. Ramalingan.Press Trust of India reported that they were found embracing each other in death. It was earlier erroneously reported that Sivarasan took cyanide.
A 22-year-old woman suspected to be an accomplice in the assassination, known only as Subha, was also among the dead, Ramalingan told a news conference. She and Sivarasan had eluded police for 90 days.
With their deaths, hopes faded of resolving the mystery of who ordered the assassination and why. More than half of the nearly 40 suspects linked to the Gandhi assassination have killed themselves before they could be arrested, according to police accounts.
Police had offered a reward of 1 million rupees ($40,000) for the one-eyed Sivarasan and $20,000 for Subha. Their photographs were plastered onto public buildings and buses across India.
The end of the biggest manhunt in India's history came on Gandhi's 48th birthday, which was being marked by memorials, prayer meetings and special programs on the state-run media.
The accused plotters of Gandhi's May 21 assassination, near the southeastern coastal city of Madras, were members of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam.
The Tigers are fighting for an independent homeland for ethnic Tamils in Sri Lanka, the island nation 25 miles off India's southeastern coast.