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The prime suspect in the alleged murder of a 29-year-old Bengaluru woman has been found dead in Odisha.
The discovery comes several days after the Bengaluru police identified the suspect and sent teams to arrest him.
According to police sources, Mukti Ranjan Ray died by suicide.
Here’s all we know about him and his connection with Mahalakshmi.
Prime suspect found dead
The body of Mukti Ranjan Ray, 30, who was allegedly on the run, was found in Odisha’s Bhadrak district village. The area falls under the jurisdiction of the Dhusuri Police Station.
Ray had visited his village around 4 am with his laptop bag, and left home on a two-wheeler. Later, his body was found hanging from a tree.
His body has been identified and sent for a postmortem. After the report arrives, police will file a chargesheet in court.
Sanjay Kumar, Odisha’s Additional Director General of Law and Order, told The Indian Express that a suicide note was recovered at the scene, in which Ray allegedly confessed to murdering Mahalakshmi.
“The Odisha police have already registered an unnatural death case. Based on the suicide note, the Bengaluru police have confirmed he is the accused in the gruesome murder case,” he told the publication.
Impact Shorts
More ShortsHis alleged motive behind the murder
Earlier, the Bengaluru police identified him as the “main suspect” in the brutal killing of Mahalakshmi, who worked as a salesperson. Police had formed special teams to nab the accused.
Mahalakshmi had started working a few months ago at a clothing factory in Malleswaram, where Ray, who was unmarried, was leading a team. They were reportedly in a relationship.
After September 2, when Ray is thought to have killed Mahalakshmi, neither has shown up for work.
As the police questioned her husband and coworkers, among other people connected to Mahalakshmi, they discovered Ray was missing from his Bengaluru home. After that, the police got in touch with his brother, who resides in Hebbagodi.
The brother informed them that Ray had called him and confessed to the murder. He asked Ray to leave the state, he informed the police.
Police believe that on that tragic day, the pair got into a disagreement regarding marriage, and Ray, fed up with her constant nagging, killed her at her Vyalikaval home, as per The New Indian Express.
The police discovered conversations between the two and had access to their call information record (CDR), which matched.
Ray was known to be aggressive. A police officer informed the outlet that the accused murderer’s brother and colleagues had all attested to his ability to kill Mahalakshmi.
The gruesome murder
Mahalakshmi’s murder, discovered on Saturday, shocked the city.
The murder came to light when Mahalakshmi’s neighbour complained of a foul smell emanating from the locked house. The neighbour informed her family, who arrived at the flat and discovered Mahalakshmi’s maggot-infested body, chopped into more than 50 pieces and stuffed into the fridge on September 21.
As per The New Indian Express report, Mahalakshmi’s severed legs were stuffed on the top shelf of the refrigerator and the rest of the body parts were in the middle and lower sections.
A postmortem report confirmed that Mahalakshmi’s body was chopped into 59 pieces.
To determine whether she had been poisoned prior to her death, samples of her intestine had been sent for toxicological analysis. The fingerprints discovered on the refrigerator were also being examined by forensic teams.
Mahalakshmi last reported to work on September 1. Her family stated that her mobile phone had been turned off since September 2.
According to her mother, Mahalakshmi was married to Hemant Das, who lives with their four-year-old daughter in Nelamangala. He runs a mobile phone accessories store. Das arrived at the spot soon after learning about the incident.
As per the cops, she and her husband had differences and Mahalakshmi left him from Nelamangala and started staying alone in Bengaluru.
Her estranged husband had told the police that she was involved in an illicit relationship with another man. He had apparently claimed she had a friend from Uttarakhand who was responsible for the murder.
Similar horrific case
The case has parallels to the gruesome murder of 27-year-old Shraddha Walkar in Delhi’s Mehrauli in May 2022.
She was strangled by her live-in partner Aftab Amir Poonawala , 29, and her body was chopped into 35 pieces.
The body parts were kept in a 300-litre fridge for almost three weeks at the residence before dumping them across the city.
With inputs from agencies
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