In yet another case of a grisly murder, a decomposed body of a 55-year-old woman was found in a plastic bag in Mumbai’s Lalbaug area. The body, chopped into pieces, was recovered from a cupboard and water tank in her house. Police have arrested the victim’s 23-year-old daughter, Rimple Jain.
The exact motive behind the spine-chilling murder is yet to be ascertained.
The incident came to light late on Tuesday when Kalachowki police were investigating a complaint that a widow, identified as Veena Prakash Jain, was missing.
The missing complaint was filed by the victim’s elder brother Sureshkumar Phulchand Porwal on Tuesday night after Rimple, who appeared to be an educated woman, refused to let his son (her cousin) meet Veena.
Porwal said that for the past three months, despite several attempts and visits, he could not meet his younger sister as each time Rimple made excuses like “she has gone out” or “she is resting”.
When the police team reached Veena’s first-floor home in the Lalbaug area on Tuesday night, accused Rimple initially refused to let them enter. The police team then smelt a stench in the house and upon searching the house, they found chopped pieces of Veena’s body, wrapped in plastic bags and stuffed in the cupboard and water tank.
“The body pieces were in an advanced state of decomposition, there was a deathly stench in the entire home, maggots and insects crawling around the place… We immediately summoned the forensic team to investigate the full home and sent the victim’s body to KEM Hospital for an autopsy,” a police official told IANS.
Electric marble cutter, sickle, knife recovered
Veena is likely to have been murdered in December of last year.
“Prima facie, the woman was killed by her daughter in December 2022. If we assume that she severed the body parts at that time, it means she has been staying with the body parts for at least three months. We are trying to find out the motive,” a senior police officer told PTI.
On Wednesday morning, Rimple, who was the prime suspect, was detained by the police for questioning. The police also recovered an electric marble cutter, a sickle and a knife — the murder weapons purportedly used to kill and chop the woman’s body.
Police are also surprised to find out that in a congested neighbourhood, none of the neighbours had any inkling of the crime. The neighbours told police that they had not seen the victim for approximately two months.
Police said that Rimple had initially claimed that her mother had suffered a fall after which she brought her home where she died. Her statements, however, had several discrepancies, raising suspicion of police that led to her arrest.
The murder is eerily similar to another shocking case reported a month ago when police found a body in the cavity of a bed in Mumbai’s neighbouring, Nalasopara area. A 30-year-old man had allegedly murdered his live-in-partner in their rented flat and hid the body in a bed box.
The accused, Hardik Shah, was arrested from the Nagda junction railway station in Madhya Pradesh as he tried to escape by the Paschim Express train. Hardik, a Mira Road resident, was unemployed and his live-in partner, Megha Torvi, worked as a nurse. Hardik told the police that their frequent fights over monetary matters led him to kill her.
(With IANS and PTI inputs)
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