Outside the mortuary of Babu Jagjivan Ram Hospital, the family of a 36-year-old woman, who was murdered allegedly by her husband and his relatives in Rani Bagh — and her body dumped in a valley at Mussoorie — waited to receive her body on Saturday afternoon.
“We knew she was being troubled by her husband and family but we didn’t know they would go to the extent of killing her, that too, so brutally,” said Sunil Aggarwal, victim Silky Jain’s paternal uncle.
The family claimed — which the police also confirmed — that the accused demanded dowry soon after marriage and the matter was pursued in Crime Against Women Cell which was later “resolved amicably”.
Silky was bludgeoned to death allegedly by her husband Lalit, his father Ved Prakash, brother Kamal, sister-in-law Swati and her brother Nayan Gupta on December 3. After disfiguring her body, they put it in a bag, dumped it in the car and drove to Mussoorie to dispose it of in a valley. The body was recovered on Friday.
Mr. Aggarwal said Silky got married on January 16, 2011. Lalit and his family always demanded money from the woman, he said. “They were after money. They kept troubling her to get money from her parents from the first month of her marriage,” said the uncle.
Mr. Aggarwal claimed that Silky’s relatives intervened many times. “They had problems if she talked to her parents and relatives often. She shared her problems with her family whenever she visited her house in Shalimar Bagh but they sounded like normal issues between husband and wife,” he said.
Silky’s brother Supreme Aggarwal recalled that the last time his family spoke to the victim was around December 1. “From December 4, Lalit would say she had gone to the market or she was in the bathroom whenever we called. It was okay for a few days but we got suspicious after that,” he said.
The Aggarwals started calling Lalit frantically and built pressure on him. “Under pressure, he went and filed the missing complaint on December 11,” said Mr. Aggarwal.
He also claimed that Silky’s relatives met Lalit and his family in the Rani Bagh police station on December 12 and asked them where Silky was. Lalit maintained that she had left home on her own and didn’t return.
However, when the Aggarwals said they were suspicious, the police interrogated the Jains at length and Lalit eventually gave in.
Deputy Commissioner of Police (North West) Aslam Khan said Lalit first strangled his wife and then the five of them bludgeoned her with a hammer. The accused went to Mussoorie to dump her body, returned in the evening of December 4, and started living life as usual.
“After the family raised a suspicion, CCTV footage near their residence in Harsh Vihar was checked from the day she stopped taking her family’s calls. On the night of December 3, the five were seen carrying a bag and driving off. When they were questioned on this, they confessed,” said the officer.
