Until this year, the three deaths in his immediate family appeared to breathe new life in Vishal Singhal, 38. Between 2017 and 2024, his wife and parents died in quick succession, he became inexplicably wealthy and even got married thrice. All that changed one night in February last year, when his fourth wife Shreya, then 28, ran screaming through Meerut’s Ganga Nagar locality — barefoot and with a child in tow — days after their wedding: “He’s a demon. I can’t stay with him anymore.” On September 29 this year, Sambhal Police arrested Vishal, for allegedly killing his parents and first wife to collect their hefty life insurance payouts. Originally a resident of a village in the neighbouring Hapur district, his family had moved into a three-bedroom house in Meerut nearly 15 years ago. Though Vishal’s arrest was triggered by Shreya’s allegations — that he had his family murdered, and was planning to kill her too — for Sambhal Police, his modus operandi was strikingly similar to the ones they were investigating since January this year. Before taking on his case, they had arrested 15 people and reopened several cases of “accidental deaths” allegedly connected to the “insurance mafia”, which reportedly got men across Uttar Pradesh insured with multiple companies and had them murdered to collect the payouts. “We had asked insurance companies for cases where policyholders had died within a year of purchasing policies, especially in accidents or due to heart attacks (for the ‘insurance mafia investigation). That’s when we came across Vishal’s case too,” says Additional Superintendent of Police (South) Sambhal Anukriti Sharma. Though insurance companies had tipped-off the local police last year, about being approached by Shreya, the probe into Vishal’s case started after Sambhal Police got involved. At that time, they already knew what to look for: a suspiciously high number of policies and road accidents or unexplained collapses as the cause of death, among others. The deaths in Vishal’s family checked all these boxes. Believed to have been fatally hit by an “unknown vehicle” in Hapur’s Garhmukteshwar in April 2024 — months after Vishal’s fourth marriage — his father Mukesh Singhal was insured under 64 different policies between 2018 and 2023. Totalling nearly Rs 50 crore, these policies had just one nominee — Vishal. The bigger question for the police was how Mukesh, who ran a small photo studio-cum-Xerox shop, and an unemployed Vishal could afford these premiums. There were other red flags too. Vishal had allegedly paid off the loans taken to buy four vehicles — three SUVs (a Toyota Fortuner Legender, a Nissan Magnite and a Brezza) and a 350-cc motorcycle (a Royal Enfield) — bought in Mukesh’s name a month before his death. Besides his purchase of expensive gadgets (two iPhones, a MacBook and AirPods), the car that allegedly hit Mukesh was being driven by Vishal’s sister’s husband, currently under arrest. Then, there was the report on Mukesh’s death by the insurance agent sent to the Meerut hospital for verification, who noted that his body didn’t have a single scratch from the alleged accident. “Mukesh’s case made us realise that it was not a one-off. The policies, payouts and loans — everything suggested a pattern,” says ASP Sharma. Besides reopening Mukesh’s case, they also started looking into the deaths of Vishal’s mother Prabha Devi and first wife Ekta. While his mother died in a “bike accident” in 2017 after being hit by an unknown vehicle near Pilkhuwa in Hapur, Ekta succumbed to a “cardiac arrest” in 2022. The FIR on Prabha Devi’s death states that Vishal and his mother were alone at the time of the accident, and that he had escaped with “minor injuries”. In 2022, Ekta, who was differently abled and had a son with Vishal, was admitted to a private hospital — the same one where his father would be taken after his 2024 “accident” — for eight days for diarrhoea treatment. Despite no history of heart disease, she collapsed and died a day after being discharged. Her death allegedly led to an insurance payout of Rs 80 lakh. “Ekta’s death hints at the possible involvement of the hospital staff,” says ASP Sharma. ‘Parade of brides’ Though not much is known about Vishal’s life in the Hapur village, his Meerut neighbours said the family lived in a mud house there, and made ends meet by washing dishes for a local halwai and working at a tea stall. It was around this time that Vishal met — and married — Ekta. The Meerut neighbours felt it was an odd match since Ekta belonged to a well-off family. “Her family bought the couple their Ganga Nagar house,” says Manju, a neighbour. “Every month, a car from her parents’ house would arrive with tins of ghee, grains and spices. Vishal would beat her often. Her situation worsened after her parents died around 2021,” she claims. Ekta’s death in 2022 was followed by a “parade” of two new brides. Meera, another neighbour, says, “Vishal’s new wives were young, underprivileged and always veiled. If they did something that displeased him, he would beat them. They left within days of their marriage.” According to the police, none of his marriages were registered in court. Then came Shreya. Allegedly introduced to Vishal by a sister-in-law, Shreya was from a middle-class Meerut family. Like the others before her, she was “disadvantaged” — a divorced single mother. They got married in February 2024. Calling Vishal “controlling” and “abusive”, Shreya tells The Indian Express, “The day we got married, he told about the insurance frauds and how he was planning to kill his father. He threatened to kill my daughter if I didn’t do as told.” Days after their wedding, Shreya allegedly discovered that Vishal was preparing to buy an insurance policy in her name. Scared, she fled. In April 2024, her father-in-law died in a “hit-and-run”. Scared for her life, she approached the insurance company, which flagged her concerns to the local police late last year. “I realised I could help stop him,” she says. Meanwhile, in the quiet middle-class lanes of Ganga Nagar, Vishal’s arrest seemingly confirmed what had long been whispered — that there was more to these three deaths in his family than met the eye. While the entire affair was disturbing, the neighbourhood was not entirely surprised. “His family was worth more to him dead than alive. Woh kehte hai na, zinda hathi lakh ka, mara toh sava lakh ka (they say a dead elephant is worth more dead than alive),” says Manju.
