‘Psycho’ killer, kin convicted in journalist murder case

The police also recovered a Tata Sumo, which was brought to his house by two persons, who too had been killed. Overall, the police had recovered broken skull parts and other bones from his house, which accounted for the murder of 14 more people. Niranjan had allegedly disclosed having killed more persons, but the police could not gather evidence.

Niranjan had told the police that he had dismembered Singh's body and thrown its parts in a lake in Rewa (Madhya Pradesh). The police had recovered some of the body parts from there. He had also told the police that he killed Singh because he was apprehensive that the latter would publish his story. His brother-in-law had also actively helped Niranjan in his activities, the police said.

During the course of investigation, the police found that Niranjan would kill people almost without reason, or if he got angry. He behaved "as a king", who would "hand out punishment" to whoever crossed his path. The prosecution had also told the court that Niranjan was given to eating certain body parts of his victims. In one case, he killed a person belonging to a certain community, on the whim that people from that community had sharp brains. He then ate parts of his brain, the prosecution had told the court.

While the chargesheet was filed in February 2001, the trial continued to drag for long as the prosecution struggled to get witnesses to depose against him. "Some of the witnesses had to be brought from Rewa. Besides, he would argue, he had been framed and the evidence recovered did not directly connect him to the crime," said a prosecution officer.

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