Revenue Department officials of Chengalpattu district exhumed the bodies of the couple — — who were murdered in Mylapore and buried in their farmhouse on East Coast Road by their driver on Saturday.
The bodies were exhumed based on the request of the Mylapore police, who are investigating the murder, and sent for a post-mortem on Sunday. In a press meet, Additional Commissioner of Police (South) N. Kannan said that only after the post-mortem is completed, the cause of death and other details of the murder could be ascertained.
Explaining the sequence of events that led to the murder and the arrests within five hours of the alert, he said the police informed their Andhra Pradesh counterparts, who nabbed the driver, Krishna, and his accomplice Ravi Rai. The duo were planning on escaping to Nepal, Krishna’s home country.
Displaying the gold jewellery, silver articles, several laptops and mobile phones stolen by the accused, Mr. Kannan said the driver had plotted to murder the couple mainly for money after he came to know of a huge cash transaction worth more than ₹40 crore in a property deal done by Srikanth a few months ago.
“The murders were premeditated. When the couple had returned from the U.S. early on Saturday, the accused along with his accomplice Ravi Rai, from Darjeeling, murdered them with a log. But on opening the locker, they found only jewellery. They stole 1,000 sovereigns of gold jewellery and over 50 kg of silver articles. They immediately used the car to move the bodies to the farmhouse in Nemmilichery, near Mamallapuram, and buried them.
Mr. Kannan said: “As per initial investigation, Krishna, who was staying in the outhouse of the victims home in Mylapore, had planned the murder in advance as part of which he had dug a pit in the farmhouse to bury them.”
The Mylapore police were alerted after the couple’s son Saswath and daughter Sunanda could not reach their parents’ mobile phones. As Krishna behaved evasively, they requested a relative in Adyar to check on their parents. The relative found the house broken into and the car missing. He immediately called the control room, who then alerted the Mylapore police.
Mr. Kannan said a team of personnel reached the Mylapore residence and found the locker empty. All the floors had also been cleaned with disinfectant. A police team rushed to the farmhouse near Mamallapuram and found blood marks in several places and a freshly dug pit. Thanking the Andhra Pradesh police for arresting the two murderers near Ongole, he said it would have been tough to catch the duo if they had reached Nepal.
The police have been repeatedly advising the public, particularly senior citizens appointing drivers or domestic aides, especially from outside the State, to thoroughly screen the applicants before hiring them. Mr. Kannan reiterated that the police could help with background checks by using face recognition software and the Crime and Criminal Tracking Network and Systems (CCTNS) portal.
