Man kills live-in partner in Naigaon: A look at other ‘suitcase murders’ in Maharashtra since 2019

June 2023: The headless body of an unidentified woman was discovered inside a suitcase at Uttan beach in Bhayandar on June 2. A local resident spotted the suitcase during a morning walk and informed the police. The deceased person. Bhayandar-based Sagri Uttan Police identified the deceased as 23-year-old Anjali Singh with the help of the tattoo on her arm and arrested her husband Mintu Singh and brother-in-law Chunchun. Inverstigation revealed that Mintu killed Anjali after he got into a fight with her, suspecting her of having an extra-marital affair. Later, Mintu sought the help of his elder brother Chunchun in disposing of Anjali’s body using a suitcase.

August 2022: The body of 14-year-old Vanshita Kanaiyalal Rathod, hailing from Andheri, was found wrapped in a blanket and stuffed in a suitcase abandoned in roadside bushes near Naigaon on August 26. The body had multiple stab wounds. A week after the body was found, the police arrested two men from Palanpur in Gujarat, and it was later found that they had kidnapped the girl and later killed her.

July 2021: The headless body of a woman stuffed inside a suitcase was recovered by the police near Bhui Gaon beach in Vasai west. The suitcase was stuck in a water channel. The police sent the body to JJ Hospital in Mumbai for postmortem, but the deceased could not be identified. The police later lodged a murder case and further probed the case.

March 2021: A body of an unknown woman in her late 20s was found in a suitcase near the main road at Shriram Nagar, Nalasopara east on March 28. The body, found in a decomposed condition, was recovered from a black suitcase. The victim’s mouth was tied with a cloth. Further, initial investigations suggested that she was strangled to death.

February 2020: The body of a 56-year-old man was found stuffed in a suitcase dumped near railway tracks, in Bavanchal, Dombivli. Thane police anti-extortion cell cracked the case within nine hours and arrested a 27-year-old man Praful Pawar, a tourist car operator from Dombivli. He allegedly killed Umesh Patil, a Kopri resident and an assistant accountant with the debt redressal tribunal office, Navi Mumbai. Pawar allegedly killed Patil as the latter was threatening the former about revealing about their intimate relationship to his (Pawar’s) wife.

December 2019: The Mumbai Police found a suitcase from Mithi river in Bandra Kurla Complex (BKC) area, containing a severed hand, among other body parts of 59-year-old Bennett Rebello. On December 2, Rebello’s leg, a hand and mutilated private parts were found in a suitcase in Mahim. Rebello was a guitarist and played music at local gigs. Four days later, the police arrested two people, including the victim’s adopted daughter, for killing Rebello. Rebello had adopted Riya and sexually assaulted her because he did not agree to her relationship with her minor boyfriend.

June 2019: Tulinj police in Nalasopara found a body stuffed in a nylon bag in a nullah in Shriram Nagar. The face of the person was beyond recognition. Later, he was identified as Krishna, who was killed by his live-in-partner Jyoti with the help of her lover Mukhtar.