Nearly 20 days after a 24-year-old girl was stabbed in broad daylight in Kurla and later died under treatment, the Nehru Nagar police on Sunday evening arrested a suspect in connection with the murder.
The arrest, however, has done little to solve the case. The police have neither a motive for the murder nor a confession, and nothing incriminating has been seized from the suspect.
At around 10.30 am on May 24, Karishma Mane, a resident of the Nehru Nagar in Kurla was on her way to Kurla station to take a train to Dadar where she worked as a salesgirl in a readymade garments store. She was stabbed under the Annabhau Sathe flyover in Suman Nagar by the assailant, who the police now suspect to be Salim Sheikh (23), and was admitted to the Surana Hospital in Chembur where she died.
The police claimed that Sheikh, a resident of Suman Nagar, was seen walking away from the scene of the crime minutes after the incident by a teenager from the area who had refrained from approaching the police out of fear.
“The boy is a Class XII student and was on his way home after attending his coaching classes when he crossed paths with Sheikh. We saw the boy passing by the spot where Karishma was murdered in CCTV footage shortly after the stabbing but were unable to find him to seek his help in investigations,” said Senior Police Inspector Pramod Khoparde, Nehru Nagar police station.
On June 6, residents of Karishma’s locality had gathered near the murder scene to stage a rasta roko on the adjacent Eastern Express Highway to protest the slow speed of the investigation, and the teenager was one of them. A Police Sub Inspector with the Nehru Nagar police, who was part of the team sent to placate the crowd, recognised the boy and drew him aside to talk to him, while senior police officials dissuaded the mob from staging the rasta roko . The boy subsequently told the police about having seen the suspect and gave them a description, based on which the police prepared a sketch, said officials.
“We made inquiries in the area armed with the sketch and identified him as Sheikh, who, we found out, has already been arrested in a robbery case in 2015. Inquiries also revealed that he had been missing for a day after the murder, while cellular location mapping confirmed his presence in the same vicinity as the scene of the crime. When we finally picked him up for inquiries, he was found to be evasive and said several things that we found to be false when we verified them independently, including the fact that he had seen two men kill Karishma. His evasiveness and lies deepened the suspicion against him,” Mr Khoparde said.
An officer who is part of the investigating team added, “The only possible motive that has suggested itself till now is robbery, as Karishma’s shoulder bag, which she was carrying when she left her residence, was never found after she was killed. It contained some cash and an ATM card.”
The police, however, have not found any of Karishma’s possessions in Sheikh’s Suman Nagar residence, nor has any other evidence presented itself during the police’s inquiries. Sheikh, on his part, continues to profess innocence, said officials.
He was produced in a Metropolitan Magistrate’s court on Monday and has been remanded to police custody till June 16. “We sought permission from the court to subject Sheikh to narco analysis, to which Sheikh gave his consent. However, the court ruled that a decision would be taken on this aspect once Sheikh’s police custody expired and he was remanded to judicial custody,” the officer added.
Cops have neither a motive, and nothing incriminating has been seized from
the suspect
