Kannada actress Hemashree: Unhappy life,unexplained death

Babu,a lawyer and real estate businessman,has been arrested by the Bangalore police on charges of murdering the actress following a complaint by her father,H Nagaraj. Babu was the last person known to have been with her,for an estimated 14 hours until her death.

How she died,however,remains unclear. Babu has claimed innocence and told the police that Hemashree suddenly had convulsions and began throwing up on October 9 in his car while the couple were on their way to the Ananthapur farmhouse of an Andhra Pradesh Congress politician.

Hemashre had claimed to have detested her husband from the day they married,June 22,2011. How she was coerced into going with him in the first place is,therefore,another mystery. One police theory was that she may have been drugged with chloroform at her parents’ home the previous night before being taken away by her husband. A toxicology report from the Forensic Science Laboratory has found traces of chloroform in the blood,stomach,liver and kidney,though it has not yet been established if this was the cause of her death.

A postmortem report of October 10 by two assistant professors at Victoria Hospital,Bangalore,noted external injuries on Hemashree’s mouth,nose and forehead,but did not document evidence of suffocation through smothering or poisoning through the blackening of tissue,expert sources said.

The subsequent forensic tests have not found any toxic substances other than choloroform,ruling out the possibility of suicide or death due to self-medication. “She had access to medicine; she had been treated for depression at the National Institute for Mental Health and Neurosciences. Last year,she had been treated at a hospital after she overdosed on her medications,” a police source said.

With the cause of death still undetermined,police are waiting for a final medical report taking into consideration the postmortem,the toxicology tests and pathology tests.

The final hours

Also holding a key to the probe is Babu’s driver,Satish,who was alongside his boss for a long part of Hemashree’s final hours but has been missing since her death.

Satish’s version on various questions — whether Hemashree was dragged off,why she was taken to the Ananthapur farmhouse,what happened in her final hours,and how she got the minor injuries on her face — will be vital for cross-checking with what has already been been said by Babu and Murali,his farmhouse friend.

While Babu has told the police that Hemashree was unconscious when they reached the farmhouse and had to be carried out with help,Murali has said his workers reported that Babu had brought an already dead woman to the farmhouse. According to his statement,Murali was away in Bangalore between October 6 and 10.

“Babu tried to contact me. When I did not receive the call,he called Krishna,my friend. He asked for permission to rest at my farmhouse since his wife had suddenly fallen ill on their way to Hyderabad,” Murali told the police. “Krishna,in turn,called Mahesh,a worker at the farmhouse,asking him to allow the couple to stay the night. When they arrived,Mahesh realised Hemashree was already dead. He alerted Krishna and asked the couple to leave to avoid trouble.”

There are discrepancies on the time the couple arrived at the farmhouse,with some versions suggesting it was late on the night of October 8 and others suggesting it was the next afternoon.

Questions also surround Babu’s behaviour in driving nearly three hours from Ananthapur with his wife,supposedly already dead,to take her to a Bangalore hospital at around 5 pm on October 9.

Marriage and after

The story of Hemashree’s life has become public since her death. The unhappy circumstances of her marriage,her disillusionment with her own family,and accusations against her by her husband as well as her family have been documented in police complaints she filed against her husband over the last 15 months,and in recorded conversations with her friends,all of which have entered the public domain.

Hemashree had begun her acting career in 2001 as a 19-year-old,carrying her own dreams and the ambitions of her middle-class family. She filed her first complaint against Babu on June 23,2011,the day after her wedding. Videos of her wedding,in fact,show her sobbing while Babu is tying the knot.

In a letter to the Bangalore police commissioner the next day,she accused Babu of having cheated her by lying about his age,saying he was 33 when he was 50. She pointed out he had a criminal record and said she had been forced to marry him because her father had blackmailed her about publicly revealing that she had taken large amounts from Babu over time.

A few days later,however,she said she had compromised,withdrew the complaint and even told a local television channel — with Babu seated beside her — that all was well between them. She said that Babu had explained to her that he had lied about his age in an election affidavit for the 2009 Lok Sabha polls,since older candidates tend to stand better chances than younger ones.

According to police sources familiar with Babu’s police record,he was at one point a candidate to be booked under the Goonda Act for anti-social elements due to a history of assault and land-grabbing cases around the eastern parts of Bangalore. In the affidavit he filed for the 2009 polls,he put down his personal value at over Rs 106 crore. After Hemashree’s complaint the day after the marriage,police sources said they had gathered that “she may have been literally sold out by her family” to Babu.

The exact circumstances of how and when Hemashree and Babu met are unclear. Some family friends say they saw Babu at their home for the first time about a month before the wedding. There is,however,indication that he may have funded her election effort as a 26-year-old BSP candidate in her hometown of Chikkanayakanahalli in central Karnataka in 2008 and that their association goes back longer.

In a complaint in September this year,Hemashree wrote to the police,“Prior to the marriage,he made multiple attempts to have sexual relationship with me but I did not relent.” According to the complaint,Babu then began trying to get to her through her parents and family by lavishing gifts on them.

“He made my parents ultimately tell me that they would commit suicide if I did not marry Surendra Babu,” she states. The letter says she was depressed by the marriage and attempted suicide once. “Ever since I got married,I have never stayed with Babu.”

In a counter to the letter,Babu accused her of running away at 6:30 on the morning after their wedding. He claimed that Hemashree had been in debt and that he had given her Rs 8 lakh to release gold she had pawned,besides gold and money amounting to Rs 40 lakh for the wedding.

Hemashree’s family has refuted the allegations of selling her off to Babu. “Ours is a decent family and my parents have taken care of us really well. It was an arranged marriage and there was no pressure from my parents,” Hemashree’s elder sister Roopashree said at a press conference following the actress’s death.

To stay away from her husband,Hemashree told a friend,according to the recording of a conversation that has surfaced in the media after her death,she moved to Hyderabad but was shocked when she learnt that her mother had been telling people that she was in Hyderabad due to her involvement in prostitution.

Hemashree’s family has denied the conversation attributed to the actress. “Why were the audio clips released to the media instead of the police who are investigating the case? I suspect foul play and want an investigation,” Hemashree’s sister said.