A private hospital owner and his nephew from Unnao have been arrested in connection with the kidnapping and murder of a 21-year-old woman, who disappeared two days after filing a sexual harassment complaint against the hospital owner, police said on Wednesday, adding that the accused dumped her body about 450 km away in Bulandshahr to hide the crime.
The police said that the accused are Dikant Uttam, owner of Uttam Hospital in Unnao, and his nephew Vivek Patil, the ambulance driver.
According to the police, the deceased, a final-year BA student from Unnao who also attended the Police Inspectors Training Institute in Kanpur, filed a harassment complaint against Uttam at Kotwali police station in Unnao on May 19, two days before she went missing. A senior officer said she called Uttam while he was undergoing treatment at the hospital.
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Deputy Commissioner of Police (South), Dipendra Nath Chaudhary, said the woman’s mother filed a complaint on May 24 alleging that her daughter was kidnapped by Uttam and Patil with intent to kill.
The complainant said Patel sent a text message to the victim on May 21 asking to meet her. The woman told her mother about the meeting before leaving the house, but she never returned and her cellphone was switched off shortly afterward, police said.
Based on the woman’s complaint, an FIR on kidnapping and suspicion of murder was registered against the accused at Bara police station.
During investigation, police arrested Patil from LLR Hospital in Kanpur, where he was admitted with gunshot wounds. Investigators said they suspected he may have shot himself in an attempt to mislead police and divert suspicion.
The woman was killed and her body was dumped on the side of the road
During interrogation, Patel admitted that he and Uttam had strangled the woman on May 21, then carried her body in a Mahindra Scorpio SUV to Jahangirabad in Bulandshahr, where they dumped her on the roadside, the Communist Party said. He was subsequently placed under arrest on Tuesday.
Investigators were not aware that the body of an unidentified woman had been found in Jehangirabad on May 25. The severely decomposed body was cremated as no one claimed it after the post-mortem examination. However, officers said that the Bulandshahr police kept the nose ring recovered from the body and its clothes as well as some DNA samples before cremating the body.
Despite Patel’s confession, investigators initially had difficulty proving that the body found in Bulandshahr was that of the missing woman. However, this breakthrough came after the victim’s family recognized the nose ring.
“We have kept the nose ring and DNA samples. The family has identified the nose ring and DNA matching is now being done,” Bulandshahr SP (Rural) Antarikhsh Jain said.
While the police intensified the manhunt for the other accused, Uttam surrendered at Bara police station on Wednesday. The Public Prosecution said that the accused are being detained and are being interrogated.
“A team of Bara police took Patel to Bulandshahr to reconstruct the sequence of events and recover additional evidence. The vehicle used in the crime has been identified, and efforts are underway to recover it,” Chaudhary said. “Every aspect of the case is being investigated thoroughly. Strict legal action will be taken against anyone found involved.”
