A bangle piece,few cloth threads lead cops to murderer

A 32-year-old woman,Sunita Devi,was killed on the night of March 18. Her body was put in a sack bag and dumped in a remote place behind a public urinal at Girgaum. It was only after a month on April 18,when a dog was seen chewing on a bone that the neighbourhood realised that something was amiss.

When the cops from Vinoba Bhave police station reached the spot,all they found in the sack was the skull,a last few threads of a green garment and a broken piece of bangle. The body was decomposed and mauled by stray dogs.

Records from the missing persons complaints across the city did not help as no woman matching the description had gone missing in that period,and the old records also did not match. Slums across the central region were checked with police and informers going through over hundreds of houses.

Finally on the seventh day,police got an input from a paanwala that a couple doing scrap business was not at their rented home in Gowalia Tank area for the last two months.

Later,police gathered that the scrapdealer,Shivraj Yadav,was living in a rented apartment with his children and his lover,to whom he was about to get married. Yadav was married earlier and had separated from his wife. “We found that Yadav paid a monthly rent of Rs 1,000,while his livelihood depended on daily scrap transactions. This,coupled with the fact that he left the city where he earns his bread and butter and did not return for over two months,caused suspicion,” said police sub-inspector C Bhosale,investigating officer in the case.

The locals at Gowalia Tank area recognised the broken bangle piece and also confirmed that they had last seen her wearing a bright-green saree. The search widened and finally a police team tracking Yadav landed in UP. When he was brought back to the city and interrogated,he confessed to his crime. “He broke down. He wanted a good mother for his children after he separated from his wife. He met Sunita in early 2008 when she showed interest in him and promised to take care of his children. However,in a month’s time,he realised that she was using his money to buy liquor as she was an alcoholic,” Bhosale said.

“They had a nasty fight on the fateful night when he punched her on chest,leading to her death. At first,everyone told us that we cannot investigate this case,but we roamed the streets with the evidence and finally nabbed the killer,” he said.