The Hindu : Cracking a tricky case

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Saturday, Jun 14, 2003

Southern States

Southern States - Andhra Pradesh-Hyderabad

Cracking a tricky case

by Marri Ramu

WHENEVER AN unidentified body is traced, the first thing an investigating officer would do is to check out the complaints about missing persons. Many a time, attempts to find out possible link between the unidentified bodies and missing complaints helped the police in identification of bodies and subsequent apprehension of culprits.

The Banjara Hills police suspected that there was a link between an unidentified body spotted on March 16 this year in Hakeempet hills and a complaint about a missing man lodged five days later. But, their suspicion did not hold water as the family members of Naveen, who was not seen after March 16, said the body was not that of Naveen.

The body was found in a highly-decomposed condition. Initially, a case of suspicious death was registered. The case took a turn with the post-mortem report stating that knife injuries were found on the body. Samples were sent to the Forensic Science Lab for DNA fingerprinting. As the connection between the two incidents was ruled out, the police launched a hunt to trace Naveen and identify the body. The first lead came when a rumour reached the police that Naveen had an affair with a woman, Salma of Sayyadnagar near First Lancer.

Further inquiries by the police revealed that Salma's brother, Arshad, warned Naveen against moving with his sister. It was learnt that Salma's marriage was fixed with a person of the same locality, Fareed.

The investigating authorities once again drew a blank when both Arshad and Fareed pleaded ignorance about Naveen's whereabouts. Though, the duo's version was doubtful, the police could not proceed further as Naveen's family members refused to identify the body as that of Naveen.

Everybody thought the investigation into the two cases reached a dead end. But, finally the mystery was cracked when a Tata Sumo driver, Sayyad Sayeed, provided an important clue.

While being interrogated in another case, Sayeed confessed to the police that some unidentified persons made him transport a body on March 16 up to Hakeempet hills at knife-point. The police picked up Fareed and two others when Sayeed's descriptions about the accused matched with Fareed and Arshad.

This time Fared owned up the crime and let the cat out of the bag. Both Arshad and Fareed bore grudge against Naveen as the latter continued to meet Salma despite their warnings. On March 16, they saw the victim speaking to Salma at her house.

Angered by Naveen's presence, the duo pounced upon Naveen and beat him up. Later, with the help of two others, Khalid and Khaja, they took him to an isolated place near MLAs colony and stabbed him to death.

The accused transported the body in Sayeed's vehicle and dumped it in Hakeempet hills. Arshad and Salma are still at large. (The case was investigated by Banjara Hills Inspector, Y. Tulasi Ram Prasad and Sub-Inspectors, G. Narsaiah and K. Chandrashekar Reddy.)

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