The body had been dumped at a forested area on the interstate highway connecting Kodagu in Karnataka and Thalassery in Kerala.
The discarded trolley bag with the woman's body in it.
A woman’s decomposed body, recovered from inside an American Tourister trolley bag, has the Virajpet police in the Kodagu district of Karnataka scratching their heads: They have only limited evidence to solve the case.
The body had been dumped at a forested area on the interstate highway connecting Kodagu in Karnataka and Thalassery in Kerala.
It was on Monday, 18 September, that a few passersby informed the Virajpet police and the Forest Department at the Perumbady checkpost that they had stumbled on something suspicious inside a blue trolley bag discarded in a forested area.
The police and forest officials rushed to the spot, cordoned off the area and conducted their investigations.
“The body seemed to be of a woman in her 20s. It was almost completely decomposed, and appeared to have been left on the spot at least two weeks ago,” a senior police officer told South First
“We also recovered a red churidar top and a yellow bottom, but there was no innerwear or ornament on the body,” he added.
The post-mortem examination was conducted on Tuesday at the General Hospital in Virajpet. The doctors suspect the woman was aged between 25 and 30 years old. They also surmised that she was of a short stature — less than 1.5 m in height.
“Samples of the skull linings, hair, molar teeth, and the femur have been collected for ascertaining the age, and other Forensic Science Laboratory (FSL) analyses,” said the police officer.
“As the skin and flesh were highly decomposed, we were unable to spot any identification marks such as tattoos or moles on her body,” he added.
The discarded trolley bag with the woman’s body in it.
Another police officer privy to the investigation told South First that the trolley bag was found dumped within Karnataka’s border with Kerala’s Kannur district.
“We cannot rule out that the murder was committed in another state and the body was dumped in Karnataka. However, it is highly unlikely, as we have a police outpost at Makkoota, and there is a Forest Department checkpost and an excise checkpost on the Kerala border, which is more than 20 kilometres from the spot where the trolley bag was found,” noted the officer.
“An assailant who decided to dump the body in another state would not have the courage to get through all these checkposts and come into Karnataka,” he explained.
“However, we have also sent a police team to Kannur and a couple of teams to Kodagu and Virajpet areas to look into missing-women cases. We have so far collected around 16 missing women cases fitting the body’s description, and are ruling out one after the other. With the dress of the corpse recovered intact, we are hopeful to get definite clues in this case,” the officer told South First.
Meanwhile, another police team managed to obtain the unique product identification code of the American Tourister trolley bag, and wrote to the the company’s legal team to furnish the basic details such as where the trolley bag was purchased and the details of the customer.
“Their (American Tourister) legal team contacted us and assured us of all the help and cooperation from their side,” the officer told South First.
Kodagu Superintendent of Police (SP) Ramarajan told South First: “We are looking into missing women cases from both the Kodagu and Kannur districts.”
The SP told South First: “Until now, we have no concrete suspicion on anyone. However, with the dress of the corpse, we are hopeful to identify the victim soon.”
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