Days after the skeletal remains of a 19-year-old girl were found in the Cauvery riverbed at Amoor village near here after she went missing in February 2012, special teams of the Tiruchi Police achieved a breakthrough on Thursday by arresting a man of the same village on the charge of murdering the girl.
The accused P. Gunasekaran, a driver, is reported to have confessed to the police that he had raped the girl before strangulating her to death using a “dupatta” and buried the body in the riverbed along with the bag, tiffin box, and identity card she carried.
After committing the crime, Gunasekaran had taken away the silver anklets and gold ear studs worn by the victim. The girl, a second year B.Com student, had left home for college on February 23 last year and had gone missing since then.
The Vathalai police booked a girl missing case on February 25 based on a complaint lodged by her father.
On November 29 this year, the skeletal remains of the girl were exhumed from the Cauvery riverbed.
Even as two special police teams were probing the case, Gunasekaran surrendered before the Village Administrative Officer of Amoor and admitted to have murdered the girl, a police press release here said.
During interrogation, Gunasekaran told investigators that he had a liking for the victim. But, Prabhakaran of the same village had fallen in love with the girl, the release further said.
Gunasekaran, according to the release, stole Prabhakaran’s SIM card and asked the girl to come to the Cauvery river bank by imitating Prabhakaran’s voice and expressed his desire to the girl.
When the girl spurned him, he assaulted her while she tried to escape. The girl who was in semi-conscious state was raped and murdered allegedly by Gunasekaran, the release added.
