Published Sep 26, 2024 | 11:20 AM ⚊ Updated Sep 26, 2024 | 11:20 AM
Suicide. (Creative commons)
The prime suspect in the murder of a 29-year-old Mahalakshmi in Bengaluru was found dead in Odisha on Wednesday, 25 September.
Police said Mukti Ranjan Roy, 30, was found hanging dead from a tree near his home at Kuleipada village in the Bhadrak district. The suspect had been on the run ever since the dismembered and decomposing body of the saleswoman was found in the refrigerator of her rented accommodation at Vyalikaval on 21 September.
Roy’s family reportedly told the police that he reached the village on Tuesday, 24 September.
The murder came to light after Mahalakshmi’s neighbours alerted her family members to a foul odour emanating from her house. The family members found the woman’s maggot-infested body cut into multiple pieces in the refrigerator.
Mahalakshmi had been staying alone in the single-room apartment, separately from her husband, Hemanth Das, 35. Das has been living with his four-year-old daughter at Neelamangala.
Investigators were on Roy’s trail and searched several places on the West Bengal-Odisha border.
Both Mahalakshmi and Roy were colleagues for six months at a fashion outlet in Malleshwaram. Roy had been living in Hebbagodi.
Meanwhile, News18 reported that Mahalakshmi’s husband Das expressed doubt over the involvement of another man, Ashraf, from Uttarakhand. Roy allegedly objected to Mahalakshmi’s closeness to Ashraf. However, police have yet to confirm this angle.
An officer attached to the Vyalikaval police station said the accused, Roy, was residing in Hebbagodi. “Call records and text messages between Roy and Mahalakshmi confirmed his involvement,” he told South First.
It has been believed that Roy died by suicide fearing arrest. “The murder news was telecast in Odisha. A Bengaluru police team was dispatched to Odisha to apprehend Roy,” police said.
The Times of India said Roy had left a death note behind. “We strongly suspect that he ended his life fearing arrest in the Bengaluru murder case. The police have had been closing in on the suspect in Bhadrak and Balasore districts for the last three days,” the newspaper quoted Bhadrak SP Varun Guntupalli.
(Edited by Sumavarsha Kandula, with inputs from Mahesh M Goudar).
