Bengaluru:The Special Investigation Team (SIT) claimed knowledge of a “larger conspiracy” behind the murder of journalist-activist Gauri Lankesh and submitted related details with names of other suspects to the court in a sealed cover on Friday.

The list of suspects includes those from Karnataka and outside of it, sources said. A massive manhunt has been launched to nab these suspects, along with one Praveen, who was named as an accused in the court based on inputs given by K.T. Naveen Kumar who has been arrested in the case. Teams have fanned out in coastal Karnataka, Maharashtra and Goa. SIT officials, who refused to disclose more details on the grounds that they would hamper further probe, requested judge V. Prakash not to name the suspects in his order.

To a specific question by the judge whether Naveen was the main accused, assistant public prosecutor Nirmal Rani said, “The main accused are yet to be arrested and the details have been submitted in a sealed cover.” A senior SIT official said Naveen was indeed in knowledge of the conspiracy and “aided and assisted its execution”, but in a “peripheral role”.

A senior SIT official said they were on the trail of a group of men who were “high up” in the chain of conspiracy, mostly from Karnataka. “There are many others from the State involved in the conspiracy to kill Gauri. The hitmen who shot her may have come from outside the State,” the official said. The police suspect that the team of hitmen who shot Gauri in September 2017 and the group that had visited the State to target writer K.S. Bhagavan were different, but Naveen knew both the teams.