Unidentified gunmen on Monday shot dead the jailor of Beur Model Prison in Patna at a busy locality shortly before he was to enter his house, police said.

Several bullets were fired at Narendra Singh, the jailor of the prison located on the outskirts of the state capital, when he was getting out of a prison van, which had gone to drop him at his residence on Nala Road.

Singh was immediately rushed to the nearby Magadh Hospital but was declared brought dead.

The motive behind the incident is yet to be ascertained but police suspect the killing to be the handiwork of jailed People's War (PW) group of ultras with whom Singh had a scuffle on March 2. After the scuffle, some PW extremists had reportedly threatened him with dire consequences.

Some of the Naxalites had begun a fast unto death in the jail since March 23 alleging corruption and high-handedness on the part of the staff in the jail premises. The PW had circulated a pamphlet through some local newspapers threatening revenge for the alleged atrocities on their comrades.

Meanwhile, Bihar Jail Minister Basawan Bhagat, who immediately rushed to the hospital on hearing the news of Singh's killing, told PTI that the jail official had been hit by about 12 bullets from an automatic weapon.

According to the FIR registered by the driver of the van, Brij Kishore Singh, with the Kadamkuan police station, the scooter-borne assailants opened fire at the jailor the moment he alighted.

Describing Singh as an upright officer, Bhagat said he had written to the Home Department and the Director General of Police several times bringing to their notice the threat to the jail officials and sought bodyguards and revolvers for jail superintendents and jailors across the state.

"Had attention been paid to my request, such an incident could have been avoided," he said.

Bhagat claimed to have also sent a recommendation to the Inspector General (Prisons) to shift the agitating PW Naxalites to the Bhagalpur jail but in vain.

The Beur Model Prison first came into the limelight when Chief Minister Rabri Devi's husband Laloo Prasad Yadav was detained in its premises during the course of the investigation into the fodder scam.