Mumbai: The police said they had solved the Gorai dismembered body case with the arrest of the brother of the 21-year-old victim’s underage girlfriend on Wednesday.
The police said the victim, Raghunandan Paswan, was in a relationship with a girl whose family allegedly opposed the interfaith match. The girl’s brother, Mohammad Sattar, was arrested from Bhayander.
Paswan lived in Pune and dealt in air-conditioning spare parts. He and the girl hailed from the same town in Darbhanga district of Bihar. Sattar is a fishmonger in Bhayander.
On Sunday, Paswan’s body was found chopped into seven parts and stuffed in four plastic paint boxes packed in gunny bags amid the bushes at Shephali in Gorai.
The body was in a decomposed state and the victim was identified by his father, Jitendra, because of a tattoo on the arm.
Jitendra said the couple met at a hospital in Darbhanga where Paswan used to work and they stayed in touch.
“The girl’s family was opposed to the interfaith relationship. I sought intervention from village panchayat heads and sorted out the matter,” he said. He said he then packed away his son to Pune.
The girl’s family took her phone away and sent her to live with relatives in the city. The police said the girl spoke to Paswan using Sattar’s mobile phone a couple of times without his knowledge.
They said Paswan came to the city with friends on Oct 31, had food and drinks, and dialled Sattar’s number. On learning Paswan wanted to speak to his sister, Sattar called him to his Bhayander residence.
The police said Sattar got Paswan drunk on the night of Oct 31. After Paswan passed out, Sattar is suspected to have killed Paswan, dismembered the body and stuffed it into empty paint boxes at his work unit.
The next morning, he is suspected to have purchased gunny bags and packed the boxes in these. The polic said he hired an auto, pretending that he wanted to carry produce to Gorai for sale.
The police said that on reaching Shephali, he dumped the gunny bags into bushes.
Jitendra could not reach his son on his mobile phone and lodged a missing complaint with the police in Andheri on the basis of his last-known phone location.
“I want the strictest possible punishment for the accused. I also want the police to probe if others were involved in the killing. My son had told me he was heading to Mumbai but did not tell me why. I suspect he couldn’t have ventured to Mumbai on his own accord unless someone lured him,” Jitendra said.