A day after Congress councillor Satyam Yadav and her 18-month-old daughter were found dead at their Nangloi residence, the police have arrested her husband Pawan Yadav.
“We have arrested Pawan and are questioning him as allegations of harassment have been made by the victim’s family,” said V. Renganathan, Additional Commissioner of Police (West District).
Earlier Satyam’s family, including her brother and brother-in-law (sister’s husband), had alleged that Pawan and his family were behind the deaths and had been harassing her for dowry. They had also said that Satyam’s in-laws were upset with her as she had given birth to a girl child.
A case had been registered against Satyam’s husband and his parents under sections 304-B (dowry death) and 498-A (harassment) and an SDM level inquiry had been initiated into the matter. Satyam, who was elected as a councillor from the Nangloi (East) Ward of North Delhi Municipal Corporation this April, had married Pawan in 2010.
A team of three doctors has been constituted to conduct the post-mortem and they are expected to submit the report soon. The medico-legal certificate of Vanshika, Satyam’s daughter, has confirmed strangulation as the cause of death, said the police.
Satyam’s brother Prashant, currently in Bulandshahr where her last rites were performed on Thursday night, demanded that other members of Pawan’s family also be arrested and expressed fears that her father-in-law could use his political connections to influence investigations. Satyam, the family had earlier alleged, was reluctant to contest the municipal elections and was pressurised to do so by her in-laws.
Mr. Renganathan, however, said that if need be police would also question other members of Pawan’s family named in the First Information Report.
Pawan was produced at a Tis Hazari Court here on Friday which remanded him in judicial custody for 14 days.
