In a new twist to the sensational Neeraj Grover murder case, the Mumbai Police Crime Branch has now named Kannada movie actor Mariah Monica Susairaj as the ‘main accused’ in the case in its reply to a bail application filed by the actress at the sessions court.In her bail plea, Susairaj had stated that she could only be charged with destruction of evidence and not murder.The police, in its reply filed before the sessions court on Wednesday, has said that Susairaj held a grudge against Grover for failing to make good on his promise of landing her a role in a tele-serial, and that she had been wanting to take revenge on him for this for a while. Susairaj, 27, and her naval officer boyfriend Emile Jerome Mathew were arrested by the Crime Branch on May 21 for the May 7 murder of Grover, a top executive at Synergy Adlabs and former creative head at Balaji Telefilms. According to the police, Mathew stabbed Grover with a kitchen-knife and then cut his body into pieces with a bread-knife. Susairaj allegedly placed these body pieces in three bags that were later burnt at an isolated spot at Manor in Thane (Rural).The Crime Branch’s reply clearly states: “She had called Grover to her house with the intention of taking revenge.”The reply also says that while Susairaj had claimed in her confession that she shouted when Mathew was stabbing Grover, “she was equally involved in the heinous crime”.Mentioning Mathew as a “witness”, the reply also states: “The applicant (Susairaj) and the witness to her crime, Mathew, have committed the most heinous crime that can cause agitation in society.”Joint Commissioner of Police (Crime) Rakesh Maria confirmed to Indian Express that Susairaj had been named the “main accused” in the case.“Although the deed of stabbing was not committed by Susairaj herself, she is very much the main accused in the murder. She has engineered the entire crime, and she is the fulcrum on which the entire episode had turned. However, Mathew is not just a witness in the case, as he is also an accused,” Maria told Indian Express.Soon after her arrest, the police had said that Grover had landed at Susairaj’s apartment on the night of May 6, stating that he would help her moving into the flat. When Mathew called Susairaj from Kochi, he overheard Grover in the background, and told her to make him leave. Police claimed that Mathew called Susairaj several times, and when he found that Grover was still with her, he caught the next flight to the city. He then headed straight to Susairaj's apartment, and on finding Grover sleeping naked in the bedroom he fought with him and then stabbed him.Later, in a turnaround, the Crime Branch stated that mobile phone records of Grover, Susairaj and Mathew had revealed that it was Susairaj who had called Grover to her house and that he had initially refused. The Crime Branch also stated that it was Susairaj who had called Mathew on the night before the murder, and had told him that Grover was acting weird with her.
