NEW DELHI, Aug 27: An Indian government politician wanted for murder and blackmail left his official residence for a sudden “holiday” in a remote tiger park just before police arrived to arrest him, media reported on Saturday.

Mohammed Shahabuddin, a lower house lawmaker from one of India’s most violent states, Bihar, told the Indian Express newspaper he was just on holiday and would surrender to police after the monsoon session of federal parliament ends next week.

“I am just here due to the weekend holiday. I am not running away,” the paper quoted him as saying. Newspapers speculated he was in the Corbett reserve.

Bihar, with tens of thousands of murders, rapes and kidnappings every year, has become a byword for lawlessness in India.

Shahabuddin, charged with killing a political opponent, among other crimes, is a local strongman from a Bihar-based regional party that is a major partner in the Congress Party-led coalition that rules India.—Reuters