A woman is suspected to have murdered another before fatally injuring her own toddler son and inflicting grievous wounds on her daughter and herself at their house in West Delhi’s Moti Nagar on Thursday afternoon.
The deceased have been identified as Reena Taneja (40) and Aarav Sharma (3). Aarav’s mother and the accused in the case, Sudesh (39), and her daughter Komal (17) are currently undergoing treatment.
According to the police, at the time of the incident Sudesh’s husband Anil and younger daughter Noni were not present at home. Sudesh had allegedly called Reena to her house on the pretext of having some discussion.
The complete sequence of events leading up to the incident was not clear till Thursday evening. The police could not record the statement of Komal and had limited interaction with Sudesh before she was hospitalised.
The police said they were investigating all angles. In a note purportedly recovered from the spot, Sudesh has accused Reena’s husband Manoj, a property dealer, of compelling her to take the extreme step.
The matter came to light when some neighbours saw an injured Komal in the balcony of her house and signalling them to help her. Describing the scene, a neighbour, Sunita Khurana, said she along with other women tried making a call on Sudesh’s phone as they rushed towards her house but found that it was out of coverage area.
“As we reached there and knocked at the main door, it was opened by Sudesh who had a knife stuck to her waist. She told us that she and her two children would not survive and requested us to tell her husband to give all the property she owned to their third daughter. We entered the house and saw Aarav lying in a pool of blood in one of the rooms. In another room we found Reena with her throat slit. Komal was lying injured in the balcony. Sudesh meanwhile had collapsed,” said Ms. Khurana.
A call was made to the Police Control Room and all four injured persons were taken to a nearby hospital where Reena and Aarav were declared brought dead. Their bodies were later sent for post-mortem. The mother-daughter duo was later shifted to the All-India Institute of Medical Sciences Trauma Centre where they are reported to be critical.
On the differences between the two women that purportedly led to the bloody outcome, the police said they were speaking to members of both the families to ascertain the exact motive of the murder-cum-assault.
“Sudesh told us that the two families had known each other for the past five years and her husband had bought some property from Manoj. However, according to her, in the recent past relations between her and the Taneja couple had soured,” said a senior police officer.
The police have not ruled out property dispute as a reason behind the incident and said they were verifying whether the note found at the spot was written by Sudesh.
