A tale of gruesome murder

It was no different on the night of August 4/5. He went past the E-block flats where Rajiv used to live, a few minutes after 1 am. Says Vir Bahadur: “There is only one gate to the complex, and I found that it was bolted from the outside.”

Reassured that nothing was amiss, he continued with his rounds. By the time it was 4 am, he had completed at least six rounds. But each time he crossed the E-block flats, he noticed that the gate was bolted from the outside. He says that he did not notice any car entering the complex. Neither did he spot any suspicious-looking person in the colony.

When Express Newsline spoke to Vir Bahadur today, he recounted the subsequent course of events on the morning of August 5 in the following manner:
He reached E-block around 7.30 am as usual. He has been cleaning the Rajahs’ two cars — a white Maruti Van and a bluish-grey Maruti Esteem — for the past two years. Both the cars are parked separately in adjacent garages.

He went to the first floor flat of the Rajah’s and rang the bell. Rajiv’s sister gave him a bucket of water and the keys for the Maruti Van. The garage key is also in the same bunch of keys.

Rajiv’s sister told him that her brother had taken the Maruti Esteem out and had not returned till then. So he had to clean only one car.

He opened the garage, where the van was parked, and cleaned the vehicle. But as the doors to the garage were wide open he did not have a view of the adjacent garage.

By the time he finished his work, it was nearly 8 am. It was then that he spotted the unlocked doors to the adjacent garage where the Maruti Esteem was parked.

He looked inside and was taken aback by the stench of vomit. He saw Monika’s limp body on the rear seat in the left hand side of the car. The left rear door was partially open and Monika’s head and left hand were outside. There were vomit stains on the floor of the garage. Monika was wearing a fawn coloured top and a pair of black trousers. He had never seen Monika earlier.

He then noticed Rajiv, also on the rear seat but on the right hand side. His head was tilted backwards. He was wearing a pair of blue jeans and a blue and white checked shirt.

Vir Bahadur says that it did not occur to him that Monika and Rajiv were dead. But he went to the Rajah household and told Rajiv’s sister what he had seen. She closed the door, and he heard her calling out for her father.

Vir Bahadur then returned to the block where he lives and cleaned two more cars.

The police called for him around 9 am. When he went back to E-block, he heard that Rajiv and Monika were dead and their bodies had been taken to the hospital.

The Maruti Esteem had been pushed out of the garage. The police asked him to cut out the portion of the seat where vomit stains had been found. It was then that he noticed a white vomit-stained towel on the driveway. The towel was not there earlier.