Less than 48 hours after his detention, P. Ramkumar, the suspected > killer of Infosys software engineer S. Swathi , who was admitted to the Tirunelveli Government Medical College Hospital in the wee hours of Saturday after he slit his throat in a bid to commit suicide, was on Sunday evening taken by an EMRI 108 ambulance to Chennai amidst tight security.
Ramkumar was expected to arrive in Chennai by 2 or 3 a.m. and would be produced before the 14 Metropolitan Magistrate in Egmore in connection with the murder.
Statement obtained
Earlier, the Nungambakkam Assistant Commissioner of Police Devaraj, who is camping in Tirunelveli since Saturday morning, along with two Village Administrative Officers – Mayilerum Perumal of V.M. Chathram and Jayaraman of Palayam Chettikulam – obtained a statement from Ramkumar from the hospital where he was recuperating.
He reportedly claimed to have murdered Swathi angered by her sarcastic remarks about his appearance when he proposed his love to her.
After Ramkumar was formally arrested on Sunday in connection with the murder, the Tirunelveli First Additional Judicial Magistrate Ramadoss visited him at the hospital around 1.30 p.m. to obtain his statement as the accused was not in a position to be produced in court.
The police, who obtained a Prisoner on Transit warrant, then carried a masked > Ramkumar inside a heavily guarded ambulance and left for Chennai around 4.20 p.m.. The ambulance has a general surgeon, an ENT specialist and a general physician to monitor him during the transfer. There are two paramedics and two pilots to ensure non-stop driving.
With the police taking over the communication en route , doctors were not sure if the accused would be taken to the Rajiv Gandhi Government General Hospital or the Government Royapettah Hospital (GRH) in Chennai as he has injured his blood vessels, which might require vascular surgery.
While the GRH has a dedicated prison ward, the one in GH was removed after the twin tower block was built. However, previously when Islamic fundamentalists Bilal Malik and Panna Ismail required medical treatment, a high security intensive care unit was created specially for the purpose.
Usual protocol
“The usual protocol in such cases is that the accused will have to be taken to Puzhal Prison for endorsement before he is shifted to a hospital. Hence we expect him to be taken to Puzhal first,” said a senior official at the GRH.
Meanwhile, relatives of patients undergoing treatment in the post-operative ward where Ramkumar was admitted in Tirunelveli said, the police interacted with him whenever he could answer their questions.
The accused had reportedly told the police that after Swathi rejected his proposal; he had come to his native place and stolen a sickle used by a farmer for cutting banana bunches. Using this weapon he killed her on June 24 and took the Chennai – Shencottai Pothigai Express train to return to Meenakshipuram the same evening. He was rounded up by the police from his house on July 1 night and allegedly slit his throat with a blade.
