Mystery shrouds the case of a Dalit girl supposed to have married five years ago but was missing for 5 years and is now suspected to have been murdered by her in-laws.
The victim, Meghashree, was a student of MET College in Bengaluru when she came into contact with T.K. Swamy of Tirumalapura village in Pandavpura taluk of Mandya district . The two are said to have married, as per Meghashree’s kin.
But the girl apparently did not retain any contact with her parents or relatives after marriage as there was opposition from her family who belong to a village in Malavalli taluk.
But her mother who was pining to see her daughter made efforts to trace Meghashree but it was futile in the absence of any definite address.
“However, she stumbled upon Swamy’s voter’s ID card in an old almirah which was being cleaned ahead of the festival, on Occtober 14. She rushed to Tirumalapura village on October 16 only to be told by the local residents that the girl was murdered by her in-laws five years ago”, according to Y.N. Mamatha, who heads a local human rights and social welfare outfit.
She told The Hindu that it could as well be a case of honour killing as it was an inter-caste marriage.
The police also reopened old files pertaining to unnatural deaths and unidentified bodies to crack the case. A photo of an unidentified woman whose body was found in a canal in 2015 is now under scanner as it resembles Meghashree, according to Mamatha.
The case is now being investigated by a team headed by Srirangapatana Dy SP Arun Nage Gowda. He said they cannot jump to any conclusion at this stage as Swamy claims that he never married the girl though they were in love.
Mr. Nage Gowda said they have gone into the old records and Meghashree’s photo bears no resemblance to the body of a woman retrieved from the canal 5 years ago. “We need to conduct a DNA test and will ensure that the probe is fair’’, he added.
