Man’s body exhumed after family suspects murder

Kin doubt his wife and her alleged lover, who is also the deceased’s cousin

The body of 33-year-old man was exhumed on Tuesday morning from a Mangolpuri graveyard after his family approached the police suspecting that the deceased was murdered by his wife and her alleged lover in Rohini’s Begumpur area, the police said on Tuesday.

Wakeel, a carpenter by profession and resident of Begumpur, died at Ram Manohar Lohia Hospital (RML) on March 9 following which his last rites were performed by the family who believed it to be a natural death.

Evidence

The family, however, found call records of his wife talking to her alleged lover who happened to be Mr. Wakeel’s cousin. Next, they also found that the woman’s driving license wherein the cousin’s name was written under the husband column.

The two ‘evidence’ strengthened their suspicions after which they approached the police.

On March 22, we received a complaint from Mr. Wakeel’s father Mohd Hanif after which the court orders were sought to exhume his body for post-mortem and further investigation, Deputy Commissioner of Police (Rohini) Rajneesh Gupta said.

The deceased’s maternal uncle Riyaz Mohd, a welder, said that he noticed his nephew’s health deteriorating for the last two months adding that on the morning of March 6, Mr. Wakeel collapsed while climbing the stairs of Mr. Riyaz’s house.

“I immediately took him to a private hospital from where they referred him to Dr. Baba Sahib Ambedkar Medical College and Hospital. In the ambulance, he had white froth coming out of his mouth. I saw the right side of his body getting paralysed,” he said.

Mr. Wakeel was further shifted to a private hospital in Shalimar Bagh where Mr. Riyaz said, the family couldn’t afford the treatment and hence shifted the patient to RML Hospital on March 8.

“The doctors said one of his nerves was blocked and were fewer chances of survival. He died on March 9,” said the deceased’s uncle. The woman’s alleged lover who was present in the hospital at the time had Mr. Riyaz not to come to the hospital, he alleged.

“Her lover is also my nephew. He may have suspected that I will get the post-mortem conducted,” he added.

Recalling the night of March 5, Mr. Riyaz said that Mr. Wakeel had allegedly heard his wife talking to her alleged lover over the phone wherein the woman was allegedly asking him to meet her.

“Mr. Wakeel confronted her and called her family the same night. There was a lot of discussion over the matter,” he said.

‘He was poisoned’

Mr. Wakeel was being administered with some kind of drug or poison for the last few months which kept him unwell, alleged his family.

“The doctors, in all the hospitals, kept asking me whether he used to take drugs but the man never even picked up a cigarette. This made us suspicious,” he said.

While going through Mr. Wakeel’s phone, the family also found a recording of the conversation between the woman and her alleged lover. A day after Mr. Wakeel’s death, the family confronted his wife about the alleged affair.

“She threatened to commit suicide and locked herself up in the room before calling her family. Her brother then called the police alleging that we were beating her. The police came and the woman left the house leaving her two minor sons behind,” said Mr. Riyaz.

About 10 days later, while cleaning the house, the family allegedly found the woman’s driver’s licence in a purse. They saw Mr. Wakeel’s cousin’s name as her husband on it.

“Whatever we found only strengthened our suspicions that he was poisoned. We approached the police on March 22. On Monday, we got a call that his body will be exhumed for post-mortem,” the uncle said.

The police said that post-mortem will establish whether the man was murdered depending upon which further action will be taken.