Kusum Rani Singla, a techie working with IBM, was murdered on Tuesday afternoon after she refused to hand over money that the suspect Sukhbir Singh demanded.
Sukhbir reached Mahaveer King’s Place, where Kusum stayed in a rented apartment, around 12.30 p.m. They had lunch together. However, during the conversation, Kusum realised that he was unemployed since 2011 and decided not to take the relationship forward. At that point, Sukhbir demanded money from her, which Kusum refused.
In a fit of rage, Sukhbir allegedly attacked Kusum with a pen, stabbing her eye brow and strangled her to death using a laptop charger. As Sukhbir’s pant was soaked with blood, he changed into a pair of jeans that was in Kusum’s wardrobe. He took her credit and debit cards, mobile phone and cheque book before leaving around 3 p.m.
The investigationAdditional Commissioner of Police P. Harishekaran, who supervised the investigation, said that soon after the murder came to light, police obtained CCTV footage and cross-checked the image of the visitor with the photographs on Kusum’s friend’s list.
Initially, the police had a list of five suspects, including her ex-husband. After a detailed probe, they focused on Sukhbir. Digital footprints pointed towards his involvement, Mr. Harishekaran said.
The South East police formed six teams to track the movements of the suspect. They gathered details about him from his interaction with the victim on social media, phone call records and air travel documents before arresting him with the help of the Haryana police.
It was their first meetingKusum had got acquainted with Sukhbir on Facebook in December last year. He had seen her profile in Shaadi.com and sent her a friend request on December 31. Kusum accepted. On January 9, they exchanged phone numbers and started to converse with each other. They decided to meet on January 19. Sukhbir offered to meet her in her flat after completing his work. He had conveyed to her that since they would be meeting for the first time, they should discuss their future.
Generated new PINAfter the murder, Sukhbir called up the bank using Kusum's phone and got a new PIN after claiming to have forgotten the existing one. Sukhbir used it to purchase a flight ticket to Mumbai from where he took another flight to Delhi. In Delhi, he withdrew around Rs 35,000 from Kusum’s account to repay a loan taken from a friend before reaching his hometown.
Wrong phone numberInvestigations revealed that after Sukhbir reached Kusum’s flat, she insisted that he make an entry in the security register at the gate. Sukhbir wrote his name but gave an incorrect contact number.
No link with online fraudThe police ruled out any link between Kusum’s murder and a cheating case she had filed at Kadugodi police station in December. “In that case, the accused had used Kusum’s credit card to withdraw cash from Kolkata. As a result, she had blocked all her cards. These are separate incidents,” Mr. Harishekaran, said.
