Mumbai: The CCTV camera of a nearby bar that captured the faces of two burglars helped the police solve the murder of an 82-year-old woman in Govandi. Parvati Tandel was attacked during a burglary attempt in March and succumbed to her injuries in April.
Based on the footage, police arrested Arvind Deshmukh and Santosh Chinchole on Friday. Both are known to be drug addicts from the same locality with long criminal records.
Police said Ms. Tandel stayed near Kailash Jeevan Hospital in Govandi and her daughter, Charusheela Patil, stayed in the same lane. As Ms. Tandel was mentally challenged, Ms. Patil would take care of her through the day and lock her door from outside at night.
Around 7 a.m. on March 25, Ms. Patil’s son Amar reached Ms. Tandel’s residence to open the door but found the lock broken. He entered and saw Ms. Tandel lying in a pool of blood. She was taken to Shatabdi Hospital and later shifted to Sion Hospital, and was under treatment for 20 days before she died on April 15.
Senior PI Uttam Kolekar, Govandi police station, said, “While investigating the case, we learned that a bar nearby had been burgled on the night Ms. Tandel was attacked. Since there were no other apparent motives behind the murder, we suspected it could be a robbery that turned violent. We investigated to see if the murder and the bar burglary were by the same person.”
Tracking them down
On going through the bar’s CCTV footage, they saw two men entering through the roof, and made images of the suspects to be circulated to police stations and informants. Eight to 10 days later, the Deonar police informed them that one of the burglars had been identified as Arvind Deshmukh, 29, who was wanted for the rape and murder of a 54-year-old woman in Deonar in 2013.
Mr. Kolekar said, “At Deshmukh’s residence, we found that after the rape and murder his neighbours had assaulted him and driven him out of the locality. His sister subsequently rented the house out and through her, we traced Deshmukh’s wife. She told us she had left him three days ago as he had assaulted her after getting drunk.”
The police made a list of Deshmukh’s known associates and frequently visited locations. Several teams were also sent to Pune and Latur, where he was suspected to be hiding. In the meantime, tip-offs from informants also helped them identify his accomplice as Santosh Chinchole, who was picked up from Buldhana on Thursday. Simultaneously, another team arrested Deshmukh from Kurla, where he was staying with some drug addicts.
“Both accused are drug addicts and commit crimes to fuel their drug habit. On the night of March 24, they broke into the bar but only found ₹806 in cash. Chinchole then told Deshmukh that he had seen a house in the area which was always locked at night, and they decided to burgle it, not knowing that Ms. Tandel would be inside. When they broke in, she woke up and Chinchole attacked her with the iron rod he had used to force the lock. The duo fled with some utensils. We have traced the scrap dealer who bought the utensils from them,” Mr. Kolekar said.
Deshmukh and Chinchole have been charged with murder and burglary under the IPC, the police said.
