Boy next door to dreaded gangster: Romil's bizarre life

The single-bedroom home in Ashok Vihar, once known as Vohra Niwas, now stands locked and abandoned, a haunting reminder of gangster Romil Vohra who once lived here before being killed in a police encounter on June 24.

- NEERAJ MOHAN

There was no one left to mourn at his residence as his parents are lodged in jail in a case connected to crimes committed by their son, and neighbours are unwilling to speak.

Romil was all of just 20 when he was killed. His death in a gun battle with a joint team of the Haryana Special Task Force (STF) and Delhi Police near the Delhi-Haryana border marked the end of a twoyear-long manhunt and a life that took a sharp and bloody detour, from the classroom and cricket to the world of crime.

Romil's journey from a cricket-loving teenager to a dreaded member of the Kala Rana Gang is now the subject of whispered conversations and state-wide concern over youth radicalisation.

Born on February 1, 2005 in Yamunanagar's Rampura Colony, Romil belonged to a middle-class family. He was the only child of his parents.

His father Kapil Vohra was a government employee and his mother Risha a homemaker.